Russia’s cyberattacks against Ukrainian civilian and critical infrastructure has shown what it looks like when cyberattacks are part of warfare. What remains to be seen is whether the world will treat them as war crimes.
“For too long, the world has been considering cyber terrorism as something unrealistic, too sci-fi-ish, and cyber weapons as not posing any serious threat,” says Victor Zhora, deputy chairman and chief digital transformation at the State Service of Special Communication and Information Protection of Ukraine (SSSCIP). “Russia’s war against Ukraine has proven such thinking wrong.”