A Kremlin spokesperson on Tuesday dismissed the United States’ warnings of cyberattacks, saying that Russia does not engage in “banditry.”
“The Russian Federation, unlike many Western countries, including the United States, does not engage in state-level banditry,” Dmitry Peskov told reporters, according to Reuters.
Late Monday, President Biden encouraged U.S. CEOs to be proactive in blocking potential cyberattacks from Russia that could be launched in response to Western sanctions over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
“It’s not just in your interests that are at stake with the potential use of cybersecurity, it’s in the national interest’s stake, and I would respectfully suggest it’s a patriotic obligation for you to invest as much as you can in making sure — and we will help in any way — that you have built up your technologic capacity to deal with cyberattacks,” Biden said.
Anne Neuberger, White House deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technology, echoed similar sentiments earlier Monday, calling on private companies to strengthen their cyber defenses. She also suggested that the Russian government is exploring “options for potential cyberattacks” and could target critical U.S. infrastructure.
“There is no evidence of any specific cyberattack that we are anticipating,” she said. “There is some preparatory activity that we’re seeing and that is what we shared in a classified context with companies who we thought might be affected.”
Russia has denied accusations of hacking and launching cyberattacks in the past. In February, the country pushed back on allegations that it hacked Ukrainian websites, Reuters noted.