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FSB: Millions of cyber attacks against Russian government foiled annually

Over the past few years, Russia has raised its information security to a qualitatively new level, Alexander Bortnikov said

© REUTERS/Kacper Pempel

MOSCOW, December 19. /TASS/. Tens of millions of cyber attacks against Russian government websites are foiled annually nationwide, Federal Security Service (FSB) Chief Alexander Bortnikov told Rossiyskaya Gazeta daily on Tuesday.

"As a whole, tens of millions of deliberate attacks on official websites and IT systems of state bodies, including the official website of the Russian president, are thwarted annually. A total of 358 individuals have been convicted since 2012 for crimes committed using computer technologies," the FSB chief said.

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Over the past few years, Russia has raised its information security to a qualitatively new level, Bortnikov said.

"Since 2013, the state system of exposing, preventing and eliminating the consequences of computer attacks on Russia’s information resources (abbreviated as GosSOPKA) has been consistently building up its potential with the FSB’s leading role," he said.

The computer networks of Russian ministries and departments, state corporations and leading banking structures are joining this system in a planned manner, the FSB chief said.

This system proved its efficiency when it prevented the infliction of damage on information resources connected to it during massive cyber attacks in 2016 and the large-scale computer virus infection in May 2017, he added.

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