Microsoft Creating a Front Line to Help Ukrainian Government
Microsoft president Brad Smith explains how the company is supporting Ukraine, including with IT services.
![Microsoft Envision UK Microsoft Envision UK](https://eu-images.contentstack.com/v3/assets/blt10e444bce2d36aa8/blt5c896db6405d1412/65242a047727ef17061dded5/Microsoft-Envision-UK.jpg?width=700&auto=webp&quality=80&disable=upscale)
Microsoft president Brad Smith gave attendees at Envision UK behind-the-scenes information as to the cyberattacks Russia has launched on Ukraine.
“With cyberattacks, we’re seeing in real time, the evolution of this hybrid war. We’ve seen it more than 200 times; we’ve seen 40 different waves of destructive attacks against hundreds of different targets. What we’ve seen as time has gone on is how events get connected,” he said.
“Within a matter of days, the Russians would go from taking down a network in a nuclear power plant through attacking that nuclear power plant. We would see how they would go from trying to disrupt the network for a city around an airport to then trying to attack and take possession of the airport. We’ve seen that time is free and expand the times down to minutes and hours at times just within a day or two. So this is a new form of amphibious warfare in cyberspace.”
Smith said Russia “fired the first shot” of the war with a cyberattack.
“If you read the newspapers, you’ll conclude that the war began on Feb. 24 when missiles were launched, and artillery shells were fired,” said Smith. “But that’s not the case. The first shells in this battle were fired in cyberspace. And we, at Microsoft, were the first to see that the very first weapon to be fired has been given a name. It’s called FoxBlade.
“It was fired at more than 300 targets across the Ukrainian government: IT companies and banks and agricultural companies. It was fired simultaneously by the Russian military in a coordinated way.”
Smith said attacks have been “remarkably sophisticated, even if they’re difficult for journalists to cover.”
He said: “They came in a very coordinated way from seven different units in three different parts of the Russian government. The GRU, which is the military, the SVR, which is the Foreign Intelligence Agency, and the SSB, which is the more traditional domestic intelligence agency. They’re far more precisely targeted than what the Russians used when they attacked Ukraine in the NotPetya attack.”
Overall, Microsoft has donated more than $100 million of technology support and services free of charge to the Ukrainian government. This includes helping the Ukrainian government move their IT to the cloud.
“One week before that war began in February of this year, the Ukrainian government was running entirely on-premises in server rooms and government buildings. The government realised that was a very dangerous place to place its digital infrastructure,” said Smith. “So we started to work with the Ukrainian government. In a matter of weeks and days, we moved the Ukrainian government to the cloud.
“We moved 16 of the 17 ministries of the Ukrainian government to the cloud. We moved in record time. We recognised that we needed not just to remove the move their data and their infrastructure to the cloud, but to move it to the cloud outside Ukraine. And that’s one of the most interesting lessons of this aspect of the work. The best way to protect our country in a time of war is to ensure its continuity by dispersing its digital assets — something you can do when you’re a company like Microsoft that has spent $12 billion in the last two years alone, building data centers in 17 countries across Europe.
“In the Baltics and other countries today, governments are recognising that you are most safe when people don’t know where your data is — when you can move it at light speed when you can move it across borders. It is something that we have done as a company for the Ukrainian government at no charge.
“We have provided now more than $100 million of technology support and services without asking to be paid a penny,” he added.
Smith also detailed the Russian-backed disinformation that it is weaponizing during the conflict. He said he had previously been aware of Russian government disinformation campaigns focused on American vaccines. The person who provided him with that information was Ukrainian president Vladimir Zelensky.
There are now plans for Microsoft to launch a new initiative to combat disinformation.
“We are going to need to develop the defensive capabilities to combat this kind of cyberattack in the same way that we combat others. By better detecting it, disrupting it, deterring it and defending against it, you’ll see us take steps to launch a new initiative in the future.”
Finally, Smith said it was of critical importance to ensure that there is accountability for the war crimes that are being committed, violating the Geneva Convention.
In the meantime, he said Microsoft is bringing technology to help be part of the rescue.
“We’re serving the United Nations by putting AI to work using real-time satellite imagery. We’ve developed an AI algorithm that can identify hospitals each day that are being attacked, damaged or destroyed. That could identify schools that are being targeted — and increasingly and most recently — water power. Because if you want to decimate a civilian population, tragically, people need water more quickly even than they need food.
“It’s just a reminder of how important it is to use all the tools that we have to try to protect people. And it’s important to ensure that we create the foundation to do what was done after World War Two. Like Nuremberg, a place we all know because that is where there was accountability for the war crimes that have been committed.
“That’s why we’re providing the technology platform free of charge for the prosecutor for the UN, International Criminal Court. It’s why we’re doing the same thing to support the Ukrainian government. It’s why we’re doing the same thing to support Amal Clooney and her legal team who are working with and for the UN and Ukraine. To make sure that there is an opportunity for history to remember what has happened here and for people to be accountable for what was done.”
Finally, Smith said it was of critical importance to ensure that there is accountability for the war crimes that are being committed, violating the Geneva Convention.
In the meantime, he said Microsoft is bringing technology to help be part of the rescue.
“We’re serving the United Nations by putting AI to work using real-time satellite imagery. We’ve developed an AI algorithm that can identify hospitals each day that are being attacked, damaged or destroyed. That could identify schools that are being targeted — and increasingly and most recently — water power. Because if you want to decimate a civilian population, tragically, people need water more quickly even than they need food.
“It’s just a reminder of how important it is to use all the tools that we have to try to protect people. And it’s important to ensure that we create the foundation to do what was done after World War Two. Like Nuremberg, a place we all know because that is where there was accountability for the war crimes that have been committed.
“That’s why we’re providing the technology platform free of charge for the prosecutor for the UN, International Criminal Court. It’s why we’re doing the same thing to support the Ukrainian government. It’s why we’re doing the same thing to support Amal Clooney and her legal team who are working with and for the UN and Ukraine. To make sure that there is an opportunity for history to remember what has happened here and for people to be accountable for what was done.”
Microsoft has revealed creation of “a new front line” to support the Ukrainian government in its fight against Russian cyberattacks.
Microsoft president Brad Smith detailed how the vendor is supporting the Ukrainian government during its war with Russia. He was reflecting on the first 100 days of “the world’s first major hybrid war” at the Microsoft Envision event in London.
Sign up for Channel Futures’ EMEA newsletter, where we feature news and analysis involving companies based in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, as well as those doing business in that region. Then register for Channel Partners Europe to network with 500+ vendors, MSPs and resellers. |
“[In] the war between Russia and Ukraine, the front line runs through Redmond, Washington — something I wouldn’t have expected a year ago. The people on the front line are our threat intelligence people, the people who work in the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Centre, and our analysts who work with them,” said Smith (pictured above).
Overall, Microsoft has donated more than $100 million of technology support and services free of charge to the Ukrainian government. This includes helping Ukraine move its IT to the cloud.
See our slideshow above to hear more about how Microsoft is supporting Ukraine. You can also see our ongoing coverage of tech’s role in the conflict here.
Want to contact the author directly about this story? Have ideas for a follow-up article? Email Christine Horton or connect with her on LinkedIn. |
About the Author(s)
You May Also Like