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Inside Ukraine’s ‘IT army’: a 300,000-strong force ‘destroying’ Russian infrastructure
Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian IT specialists live inside the country or abroad, with many involved in the online fight to defend their country against Russia.
Published 11 March 2022 2:50pm
Updated 11 March 2022 4:29pm
By Tom Canetti
Source: SBS News
Image: Nikolay is a member of the "IT army". (SBS News)
Two weeks ago, Nikolay, a Ukrainian marketing specialist who lives in Spain, received a phone call that changed his life. It was the mother of his 11-year-old daughter, explaining that Russian forces had begun an invasion.
Nikolay turned on his television and hoped, like many Ukrainians had since 2014, that Russian President Vladimir Putin was bluffing again.
But the nightmare was true.
Nikolay said he was "paralysed from fear" for the first two days of the war.
His elderly mother and young daughter were still in Ukraine, and he didn't know how he could help those fighting and dying in his country.
He describes Russia as a country where Ukrainians have "so many good friends", and couldn't understand how they could attack them, even during the morning while they slept. He said they're denying them of their dignity.
'Destroy the enemy's infrastructure'
But he wasn’t alone. On the third day of the invasion, Nikolay enrolled in the Ukrainian "IT army" — a 300,000-strong cyber force fighting against the Kremlin.
Ukraine has hundreds of thousands of IT specialists living inside the country or abroad, helping thousands of companies around the world build their IT services. Nikolay said the majority of these people are now involved in the war.
Members of the online army apply their IT skills to "destroy the enemy's infrastructure" such as the Kremlin, FSB (the Russian Federal Security Service) and local media websites.
They follow orders from the so-called "digital government" which was formed by the media agency that helped Volodymyr Zelenskyy become president of Ukraine.
Messages are being sent among the IT community in Ukraine. Source: Supplied
The latest post on their Telegram group has been read by more than 100,000 people and was an instruction to "destroy" a Russian propaganda media outlet.
While men in Ukraine of fighting age must remain in the country, many of which head to the front line, recruitment for the IT army is diverse, with an open invitation to anyone with a smartphone or computer.
"When we are talking about the Ukrainian IT army, you should understand that it's not just about hackers — a stereotypical anonymous hacker who sits somewhere and they are like pure evil — who use code instead of grenades," Nikolay said.
He said the IT army consists of thousands of "designers, creatives, account managers and marketing people" from agencies, production houses and design studios. They create digital campaigns against misinformation, raise money for refugees, and compromise Russian military infrastructure.
Even children are helping spread what the IT army calls the "Russian truth".
When they play games like Counter-Strike or Fortnite against Russian opponents online, gamers send videos and information about the fatal effects of the Russian forces' shelling or debunk Mr Putin's narrative that the Ukrainian government is full of neo-Nazis and drug addicts.
"Before, it was just a strong man that has known how to use a gun — just a strong man who knows how to fight — who was involved in the conflicts. Now, everyone, genderless, ageless, can become part of the Ukrainian resistance," Nikolay said.
Photographs from before the war have been transformed into an "indestructible" NFT collection. Source: Supplied
The project consists of a collection of 40 pre-war images from Ukrainian photographers, which founders Kostia and Sam describe as "our last chance to document our homes, cities, culture and way of life".
In line with the IT Army’s mandate of positive messages, the images capture moments of life and happiness.
The most significant photographs have been transformed into an "indestructible" NFT collection, with all proceeds being donated to charities supporting Ukrainians who have lost their homes or loved ones due to the war.
Professor of Commercial Law at Bond University, Dan Svantesson, has put together a law reform proposal outlining under what circumstances a person in Australia should be able to join a cyber militia and at the same time ensuring that Australia has sufficient control and complies with international law.
Professor Svantesson said we need to have a discussion about "whether there are circumstances under which a person should be exempt from Australian hacking laws when part of an organised cyber militia like that of the Ukraine IT Army".
Meme-ification of the Russian Army
Inspired by former comic-turned-president Mr Zelenskyy, Ukrainian comedians have joined the online army to connect with their compatriots through humour. They help keep spirits high by creating memes and by mocking Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Nikolay said the biggest hero on the Ukrainian side is a meme, which was created after coastguards on a remote island told a Russian warship to "go f**k yourself". He said the story became a central symbol of the "meme-ification" of the Russian army — one of the many ways Ukrainians are employing humour as their weapon, even in the face of death.
He said, thanks to memes, Ukrainians now see the famous Russian bear as a "weak cat".
"It reminds me of theatre when basically a director is controlling the emotions of the crowd. It's this dream state that Hollywood has been dreaming of and it's highly important now when there are millions of people, of refugees trying to get out of the country in panic, and you need to control their emotional states," Nikolay said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Donbas. Source: Anadolu / Anadolu Agency/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
The objective of the Ukrainian IT army extends beyond fighting against Russian forces and media.
Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Kyiv has embraced progressive Western values. The city has become a hub for LGBTIQ+ people in eastern Europe and has promoted the empowerment of women, both of which could be under direct threat from the imposition of a pro-Russian regime.
Russia provides no anti-discrimination protections for LGBTIQ+ people, nor does it prohibit hate crimes based on sexual orientation and gender identity. In 2017, a panel of five expert advisors to the United Nations Human Rights Council condemned a wave of torture and killings of gay men in Chechnya. Similar criticisms of Russian repression have been heard by the feminist community.
The Ukrainian IT army is making an international appeal for attention, hoping that if not for the protection of their own citizens, the West will defend them to preserve the values of Western democracy. But according to Nikolay, the most difficult task is keeping the West’s attention.
He said the "banality" of the war lies in the "Attention Economy" driven by YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and other social media, where Ukrainians are competing for the attention of millions of people globally "between war and the new Batman series or between a kid being born in a shelter and an advertisement of a new car".
Nikolay’s eleven-year-old daughter spent her first birthday in exile this week.
Her wish: that the world doesn’t lose sight of Ukraine.
