Ukrainian cyber/information security/IT news analysis for 2019 year

On New year holidays I decided to made a Ukrainian media monitoring report for 2019 year. One of the most popular media resources (Segodnya.ua) was chosen for this task. The goal was to identify the most important news about information security, cyber-attacks and influence of IT on the Ukrainian society. Below presented the trends and highlights from this analysis:

 - total number of news articles on the chosen media was ~90,000 for 2019 year;

 - it was possible to select ~250 articles most relevant to the research topic. They divide into the following clusters:

 * Internet/IT related fraud (e-commerce fraud, donations fraud)

 * fight of Ukrainian law-enforcement against bloggers who post anti-Ukrainian posts in the social networks

 * security of 2019 elections (e.g. hunting for people who were making selfie photos in the voting booths)

 * state secrets security and spies

 * public/state services delivery over electronic channels

 * fight with casinos (they use electronic channels a lot) 

 * hacker arrests in accordance to orders from FBI/Interpol

 * different Ukrainian laws and their drafts that were related to IT/digital/communications

 * new electronic services from private companies

 * digital piracy

 * carding crimes

 * scandal related to Trump/Zelensky presidential communications which were intercepted

 * fight with online pornographic studios

 Most interesting facts:

  * number of information crimes grown in 2.5 times (for the first half of 2019 were registered 1005 cyber-crimes)

  * there is a tremendous grows in number and quality of Ukrainian public/state digital services

  * a number of law enforcement servants were prosecuted for intercepting and selling personal data and communications of Ukrainian citizens 

  * for the first half of 2019 year were emitted 85.4 mln. UAH. as electronic/digital money (a dozen of banks can do that)

  * Ukrainian IT specialists were stealing money from their employers (one of them was working even in Microsoft! another in the EU cryptocurrency market). 

  * more and more popular lie detectors (polygraphs)

  * was registered a high-profile signal intelligence attack on the TV channel Ukraine during presidential elections (using an equipment which costs a lot of money)

  * at the beginning of 2019 year in Ukraine were 36.9 mln. active banking payment cards

  Some numbers in the 2019 year articles were related to the 2018 year facts which were analyzed in 2019:

  * volume of online fraud in Ukraine 2018 year was 245 mln. UAH.

  * in 2018 year state CERT-UA (computer emergency team) registered 600 attacks on the state objects, in 2019 more than 300.  

  * in 2018 year Ukrainians purchased 5.4 mln. smartphones and 1.5 mln. old-facion phones, 610,000 laptops.

  * market volume of e-commerce in 2018 was 65 bln. UAH.

  * in Jan 2018р. 58% of Ukrainian citizens were using Internet- 22.59 mln. people, 13 mln. were using social networks

My main recommendations and conclusions from this media analysis:

 - conduct a very careful background checks/life-style monitoring of Ukrainian IT employees and counter-parties

 - expect the growth of attacks/fraud related to the public/state electronic services 

 - implement social media acceptable use policy and codes of ethics for employees