‘Chaos and disorder': Russian spies named, sanctioned by UK government
The UK government revealed the Russian agents who engaged in the attacks over more than a decade, in a rare exposure aimed at highlighting the scale of the threat to the public.
The operations included a 'sustained campaign of malicious cyber activity' over many years – some of them by a hacking unit previously named by ASIO for presenting the same threat to Australia.
The British Foreign Office warned of the 'chaos and disorder' from the operations and blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin for the crimes, while imposing sanctions on 18 individuals.
The hacking included targeting Russian émigré Yulia Skripal with malicious malware known as X-Agent in the years before she and her father Sergei – a former Russian military intelligence officer – were almost assassinated.
Russian agents tried to kill the Skripals in March 2018 by smearing the nerve agent Novichok on the family's front door handle, but the father and daughter recovered from the poison. One person who came into contact with the discarded nerve agent died, while others suffered severe illness.
The Foreign Office did not name the other targets of the Russian hacking, but revealed the identities of the military intelligence officers as well as three units of their agency, the GRU.
The European Union separately announced sanctions against nine individuals and six entities on Tuesday for electronic warfare, hacking and other malicious attacks.
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