E-Business
Hacktivism and the New Age of Cyber Warfare
By Sergey Shykevich
Hacktivism has traditionally been associated with loosely managed entities such as Anonymous. These decentralized and unstructured groups are typically made up of individuals cooperating in support of a variety of agendas and many groups have an open-door policy for recruitment.
However, over the last year, and following developments in the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, the hacktivist ecosystem has matured, in both origins of source and motivations.
Hacktivist groups have tightened up their level of organization and control, and today you will see them conduct military-like operations including recruitment and training, sharing tools, intelligence and allocation of targets.
For example, following Russian attacks on Ukrainian IT infrastructure at the beginning of the war, Ukraine set up an unprecedented movement called “IT Army of Ukraine.” Through a dedicated Telegram channel, its operators manage more than 350,000 international volunteers in their campaign against Russian targets.
On the other side of the battlefield, Killnet, a Russian-affiliated group, was established with a military-like organizational structure and a clear top-down hierarchy. Killnet consists of multiple specialized squads that perform attacks and answer to the main commanders.
Most new hacktivist groups have a clear and consistent political ideology that is affiliated with governmental narratives. Others are less politically driven, but have nonetheless made their operations more professional and organized through specifically targeted campaigns motivated by social rather than economic objectives.
Who’s responsible and do we know for sure?
This type of cyber warfare is not only about inflicting damage. All active groups are aware of the importance of media coverage, and they use their communication channels to announce successful attacks and re-publish them to maximize the effect and elevate the fear of such hacktivist attacks.
For example, Killnet has more than 91,000 subscribers on their Telegram channel, where they publish attacks, recruit team members and share attack tools. There is also extensive coverage of the group’s activity on major Russian media outlets to promote their achievements in cyber space and validate the impact of their successful attacks on their ‘enemies’ or anti-Russia entities.
Increasingly, there is a rising trend in groups claiming responsibility for cyberattacks when in reality, they had little or no involvement in them. Germany’s flagship airline, Lufthansa, experienced a severe IT issue in early 2023 which left thousands of passengers stranded at several airports across the country. It was thought to be the result of construction work causing damage to external cabling.
Pro-Russian hacktivist group, Killnet, claimed responsibility for the attack and said it was retaliation for Germany’s support of Ukraine. The group published a statement via its social media channels saying: ‘We killed the Lufthansa employee corps network with three million requests per second of fat data packets.
These were experiments on rats that were successful. Now we know how to stop any navigation and technical equipment of any airport in the world. Who else wants to supply weapons to Ukraine?’
Despite this assertive message, there is little evidence to suggest that Killnet had any involvement in the attack and were in actual fact attempting to enhance their notoriety and increase levels of fear. It is not always easy to establish who or what organisation is responsible for an attack and it is even more difficult when the incident is potentially state-sponsored.
Who is the person (or government) behind the mask
There is a big difference between claiming responsibility and being responsible. Operating under the cloak of anonymity may be seen as a way of legitimising state-sponsored attacks, but when does it become terror, not disruption?
Research conducted by the University of Notre Dame argues state-sponsored hacktivism is ‘weapons and attacks in the cyber domain intended to produce political effects similar to those usually sought as the goal or objective of a conventional use of force by states against one another’.
Such an approach means nation states can act anonymously within the cyber world, and perhaps most importantly, without fear of retaliation and without taking responsibility for the attacks.
By targeting components of critical infrastructure such as financial or healthcare institutions, government buildings, energy suppliers or emergency services, attacks aim to cause maximum disruption. Though with such significant backing, the aftereffects of an attack such as this could be on a par with those where force had been used.
Prior to Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine, hacktivism was a scarcely used term in a serious context and was arguably on the decline. However, the war prompted a surge in activity from known and unknown groups. Those unknown parties are the ones that create the most intrigue, as they are potentially being aided by government organisations to carry out attacks on targets for political gain.
For example, within 48-hours of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine there was an 800% increase in suspected Russian sourced cyberattacks. Activity hasn’t slowed either.
According to Check Point Research in the second half of 2022, Killnet, the biggest Russia affiliated hacktivist groups targeted more than 650 organisations or individuals, interestingly only 5% of which were Ukrainian.
It is not just Russia who are believed to be using government resources to aid cyberattacks, but groups allegedly in Iran, Israel and China also may have links to state-sponsored activity.
What will hacktivism look like in 2023?
The frequency and sophistication of attacks in this new era of hacktivism will raise questions about their origins. Who or what organisation is behind the mask and are their actions motivated by political gain or terror? In the year ahead, it will become increasingly more difficult to identify what is a government, hacktivist or cyberattack.
It may be too soon to refer to hacktivism as state-sponsored terrorism, but there is no doubt that it is becoming harder to disconnect one from the other. As geopolitical tensions continue to dominate the world agenda this new age of cyberwarfare will only get worse, before it gets better.
Sergey Shykevich is Threat Intelligence Group Manager at Check Point Software.
African startups raised more than $345 million across 65 deals in May, more than double the amount raised in the same period of last year, according to a report by Briter, a research and business intelligence firm.
The report disclosed that both the number of deals and participating companies declined, confirming a growing trend of fewer companies raising funds in larger sizes.
It said fintech attracted the highest share of funding in May, accounting for 34 percent of the total, while cleantech followed closely, driven by a debt deal from Sun King. The company raised $80 million (in local currency) to expand clean energy access in Nigeria.
“Equity remains the primary instrument in terms of total value. There’s no doubt about it; in fact, equity deals with disclosed amounts captured more than half of the total funding volume in May.
“However, debt financing is increasingly proving its weight. Although it accounted for only 8 percent of all deals, it represented 32 percent of the total funding, highlighting the typically larger size of debt transactions. With the rise of specialised vehicles targeting early-stage businesses, debt is becoming an increasingly important part of Africa’s innovation funding landscape,” it said.
Briter’s report added that grants continued to play a vital role in early-stage support, especially in the education technology (EdTech) sector. The Mastercard Foundation led the pack in grant activity, funding a new cohort of EdTech innovators in Nigeria and Kenya. Each selected startup is set to receive $100,000 in grant funding, in addition to mentorship and business development support.
Multilaterals also made a strong showing in May, it said. The Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA), a World Bank Group member, issued a $179.6 million guarantee to CleanTech firm KOKO Networks. The support will help scale its clean energy solutions across Kenya.
“This deal not only demonstrates growing international confidence in African climate ventures but also signals a promising pathway for other asset-intensive startups in clean cooking, agriculture, and renewable energy,” the report said.
From a geographic perspective, Egypt emerged as the continent’s fundraising powerhouse for the month, contributing 51 percent of all funding raised. The country recorded 12 deals across equity, debt, and bond instruments. Notably, FinTech platform MNT-Halan raised $50 million through a bond issuance, further illustrating the diversification of capital-raising mechanisms in the region.
Outside Egypt, funding was distributed across Africa’s three other key markets, which are Egypt, Nigeria, and Kenya, with limited activity recorded in countries such as Ghana, Tunisia, Morocco, and Uganda, each registering between one and three deals.
In terms of exits, the African tech landscape continues to mature. Three companies—Baobab+, Qardy, and Shopa—were acquired in May, bringing the total number of exits this year to 22. This already surpasses last year’s count for the same period. Qardy was acquired by Catalyst Partners Middle East (CPME) in a disclosed deal valued at $23 million, the report added.
By Nancy Werteen
When you get anti-hacking advice, you’ve probably heard “Don’t use a simple password,” or “Don’t plug in that USB you found on the ground.”
But there’s one form of hacking that doesn’t always require a computer, and it costs businesses about 4.88 million dollars a year.
Modern hackers aren’t trying to get into your computer; they’re trying to get into you.
“They’ll try to learn about you a little bit, and they’ll try to use that information against you to try to get you to complete some action, maybe to send somebody some money,” said Kevin Moran, PhD, Assistant Professor of Computer Science, Cyber Security and Privacy Cluster, University of Central Florida.
IBM calls this human hacking, because it exploits human error instead of system error.
“With people just being busy and maybe not very carefully checking some of the emails or the phone calls that they get, can be something unfortunately that people can fall victim to,” said Moran.
Also known as social engineering, this often takes the form of phishing, where the hacker tries to “fish” the information out of you by impersonating family, friends, or even your bank.
There’s also baiting, where the hacker baits you with something of value. Remember the Nigerian prince scam?
That’s a famous example of baiting. There’s also pretexting, where the hacker will claim the victim has already been hacked, and that the hacker can fix it if you just send over your passwords. So, what can you do?
“Just as a rule of thumb, instead of clicking on links and emails, just go to the website yourself. And that will prevent, a lot of these types of attacks from happening,” explained Moran.
Phishing can take many forms.
Spear phishing targets people with access to confidential information, often to get access into an entire business, and whale phishing targets CEOs or political figures.
Search engine phishing is when hackers create fake websites promising services or goods you’ll never receive.
Angler phishing is when hackers create fake social media accounts impersonating famous people or companies.
Finally, vishing and smishing is phishing done through phone calls and texts respectively.
Federal government has said that it has successfully captured 59,786 inmates, representing approximately 74 percent of the total prison population into the National Identity Number (NIN) database.
This figure is based on a total of 80,879 inmates across 256 custodial centres across the country.
Abubakar Umar, spokesman, Nigerian Correctional Service (NCoS), Deputy Controller of Corrections, who made this disclosure in a statement issued on Sunday in Abuja, dismissed recent media reports alleging that the NIN registration had yet to begin in custodial centres.
Umar described such report as misleading, inaccurate, and not representative of the current situation.
According to Umar, the NIN registration exercise within the correctional facilities was ongoing and has achieved substantial progress.
He credited the achievement to collaboration between the NCoS and the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), which has enabled successful enrollment of majority of inmates into the national identity database.
According to him, “As of June 7, 2025, a total of 59,786 inmates, roughly 74 percent cent of the total inmate population have been captured on the NIMC platform,” Umar said.
“Efforts are ongoing to register the remaining inmates, and necessary mechanisms have been established to ensure the seamless completion of the process.”
He emphasised that the assertion that NIN registration has not started in custodial centres was factually incorrect and overlooks the extensive work already carried out.
The Service reaffirmed its commitment to integrating all inmates into national data systems, including NIN registration, as part of broader efforts to support rehabilitation, reintegration, and digital inclusion for individuals in custody.
Umar also urged media outlets to confirm their information with appropriate authorities before publication to prevent the spread of misinformation that could undermine the Service’s progress and public understanding.
ngCERT Issues High Alert to Nigerians Using Android Phones
OSGOF, NASRDA Partner to Boost Geospatial Data, Others
World Bank Maintains Nigeria’s Growth at 3.6% Amid Trade Tension
SEC Insists CBEX Ponzi Remains Banned in Nigeria
African Startups Raised $345m in Funding in May
Telecom3 days agoTelcos Hit by Major Outages across Lagos, Enugu, Others
E-Business3 days agoHuman Hacking: When Cyber Criminals Target You
News3 days agoBeware!, Fraudsters Using our Name to Defraud Investors- NNPCL
E-Financial3 days agoAGF Drops Charges Against Fidelity Bank MD, Cites Lack of Direct Involvement
E-Financial3 days agoFIRS Launches Revised SOP to Streamline Tax Payment
E-Financial3 days agoConfidence in Nigerian Economy Grows as Forex Inflows Reach $5.96Bn
News3 days agoFG Plans AgriConnect Initiative Pilot
News2 days agoCDCFIB Warns against Recruitment Racketeers