Russia used social engineering to breach prominent messaging accounts, Ukraine says
Ukraine's security service, the SBU, has detailed a sustained Russian intelligence operation in which operatives posed as technical support staff to trick targets into surrendering login credentials for their messaging accounts. The campaign gave attackers direct access to private communications.
Why this matters: No malware, no zero-day exploit. Just someone pretending to be tech support until you hand over your password. That works because people trust the framing more than they scrutinize the caller. The targets here are likely journalists, officials, and activists, but the method travels. If a state intelligence service is running this playbook at scale, so is everyone else. The lesson is not complicated: no legitimate service will ever ask for your credentials. The hard part is remembering that when someone sounds convincing and the request feels urgent.
Who should care: Cybersecurity · Privacy officers · Administrators
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