UK Unprepared for Russian Cyber War, Ukraine’s Rapid Response Offers a Blueprint

Russia’s war on Ukraine has extended into cyberspace, with Moscow targeting UK hospitals, telecoms, power plants and the nuclear deterrent. The NCSC logged over 200 major cyber incidents against British critical infrastructure in the past year, double the previous total.

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Russian-backed groups, including GRU Unit 26165, have launched distributed denial-of-service attacks and hacking operations against Ukrainian and allied networks, making cyber defence a central front of the conflict. These operations aim to disrupt command, control and public services, mirroring kinetic attacks on the ground.

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The NCSC’s 200-incident count reflects a rising threat. A Public Accounts Committee report found 28 percent of public-sector IT assets are risky legacy systems, while Ukraine has distributed over 30,000 YubiKey devices to protect public and energy organisations.

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Ukraine compresses research and development to days, delivering UAV-jamming tools and password-less authentication. Brave1, a Ministry of Digital Transformation platform, promotes user-driven solutions, while Hideez and Yubico supplied YubiKeys free of charge to meet urgent needs.

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Defence Secretary Dan Jarvis said the surge in attacks shows the cyber front line is already present. NCSC chief Richard Horne warned that conflict involvement could trigger large-scale hacktivist attacks, urging adoption of passkeys. In April, the NCSC advised consumers to abandon passwords for passkeys on apps and websites. MI6 head Blaise Metreweli described the UK as in a “space between peace and war”.

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A Public Accounts Committee review highlighted bureaucratic delays that slow procurement and noted a gap between threat magnitude and the UK’s response. Reliance on outdated legacy systems leaves critical services vulnerable, and the government lacks a clear picture of overall resilience. The report also flagged the absence of a unified metric to assess national cyber resilience.

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• “That number tells me the front line isn’t coming – it’s here,” — Dan Jarvis, UK Defence Secretary

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• “hacktivist attacks at scale” — Richard Horne, NCSC chief executive

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• “Research and development cycles here are measured not in months or years, but in days. Our defence technologies are born out of immediate necessity and shaped directly by battlefield realities,” — Andrii Hrytseniuk, CEO of Brave1

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• “In modern warfare, cyber defence is not a secondary concern. Using passwords today is like defending yourself with weapons from the last century,” — Oleg Naumenko, CEO of Hideez

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The NCSC’s push for passkeys marks a shift to modern authentication. Ukrainian experts advocate decentralising digital assets to avoid single points of failure. The UK plans to deepen cooperation with Ukrainian cyber firms and speed up procurement to close the legacy-system gap before further Russian attacks.

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