disBalancer
| Disb logo png.png Logo since 2015[update] | |
| File:Disb logo png.png | |
| ISIN | 🆔 |
|---|---|
| Industry | Sybersecurity, blockchain, distributed network |
| Founded 📆 | 2021 |
| Founder 👔 | |
Area served 🗺️ | |
| Products 📟 | Stress testing, DDoS Security Consulting, Scam Blocking |
| Members | |
Number of employees | |
| 🌐 Website | disbalancer |
| 📇 Address | |
| 📞 telephone | |
disBalancer is a cybersecurity Web 3.0 project that provides B2B stress testing, security consulting, and scam blocking services. After the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, the project team created Liberator software for DDoS attacks on Russian propaganda sites to fight it in the information war with a recruited cyber army.[1].
Initially, the disBalancer team took part in the First Grey Hat Hackers Ideas Competition led by Community in April 2021. After winning the Special Prize, the project joined the Hacken Foundation, a cybersecurity venture based in Ukraine, to further develop its blockchain and cybersecurity tools [2].
Contribution to the First Cyber War
When the Russo-Ukrainian war entered the full-scale invasion stage, the project couldn’t stay impartial. From the beginning of the full-scale invasion, the disBalancer team took down Russian propaganda webpages that abound to misinform about the Russian war against Ukraine [3]. And following the plea from Mykhailo Fedorov, Minister of Digital Transformation, the team chose to bolster the Ukrainian IT Army and solidify efforts with other Ukrainian IT professionals, thus acting in coordination with the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine to wage a cyberwar against Russian propaganda [4]. Although the disBalancer team is a cybersecurity project that aims at protecting its users from DDoS attacks, seeing the impact of Russian misinformation on developments in Ukraine made them temporarily flip sides and turn the code into an offensive too to nip Russian propaganda in the bud. Liberator App was made to stop Russian propaganda webpages from spreading blatant lies about Nazism in Ukraine that spurred violence, and called for genocide, including footage taken in Ukraine to create an alternate reality for Russian users, etc.[5]
Targets, attacks vectors, and followers
Liberator implements 5 vectors of DDoS attacks: critical infrastructure resources (banks, railways, accounting, and tax accounting systems, streaming services, etc.); vital resources used by common Russians; Russian propaganda media outlets; fake donation resources that reaise funds aimed at supporting Ukraine; Russian sabotage and espionage groups collecting and disseminating information about the Ukrainian military [6].
Support and criticism during the cyber war
The project received widespread informational support [7] [8] [9] [10]. The company claims to have gained 10 000 users which provided 6000 active users to its Liberator initiative in just 4 days.[11] More than 100 thousand people have installed Liberator in the last month and a half. The majority of them are from Ukraine, with a great share of international supporters, but their geography is hard to define as the company calls its users to use VPN services for safety reasons. The total number of installations exceeded 100,000 new users. Most of them are Ukrainians, but it is impossible to find the data on the geographical location of users as the attacking process requires using VPN services [12].
Dissemination of disBalancer about hacking activity has led to malicious info-stealing software called Disbalancer.exe mimicking the company’s name and style was distributed through Telegram channels [13]. It caused a stir in cybersecurity blogs, some of which debunked the accusations of DisBalancer being a malicious tool towards its users, but cybersecurity companies have denied disBalancer's involvement in stealing user data [14].
Future goals
The company aims to ramp up the scale to 100 000 active users, following the number of downloads of its tool [15]. Simultaneously with the participation in the cyber war against Russia, the team is preparing and will soon announce the launch of cybersecurity products in the digital space to help companies identify DDoS vulnerabilities. The services currently being developed by the team are the DisBalancer Distributed Networking, Stress Testing, Token launch protection, and DDoS consulting [16]
References
- ↑ "disBalancer Launches Liberator". March 4, 2022.
- ↑ "About us - disBalancer.com". disbalancer.com.
- ↑ "disBalancer Stays With Ukraine". March 1, 2022. Archived from the original on July 4, 2022. Retrieved June 25, 2022.
- ↑ https://twitter.com/FedorovMykhailo/status/1497642156076511233?s=20&t=h-njc0cITwzQdkBk6fiqxg
- ↑ Porter, Tom. "Kremlin propaganda is directly responsible for Russia's genocide in Ukraine, war-crime investigators say". Business Insider.
- ↑ "Liberator Stats In The First Three Months Of The Cyberwarfare". May 23, 2022. Archived from the original on June 9, 2022. Retrieved June 25, 2022.
- ↑ https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-08/cloudflare-rebuffs-ukraine-requests-to-stop-working-with-russia
- ↑ Editor, Tom Calver, Data Projects. "Recruits flock to Ukraine's cyber-army" – via www.thetimes.co.uk.
- ↑ https://www.politico.eu/article/kyiv- cyber-firm-state-backed-hacking-group /
- ↑ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/02/27/ukraine-russia-war-propaganda/
- ↑ https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-08/cloudflare-rebuffs-ukraine-requests-to-stop-working-with-russia
- ↑ https://www.businesspost.ie/tech/online-battle-how-ukraines-cybersecurity- experts-became-citizen-soldiers-for-the-digital-era /
- ↑ https://threatpost.com/malware-posing-russia-ddos-. tool-bites-pro-ukraine-hackers / 178864 /
- ↑ Neal, Chris. "Threat advisory: Cybercriminals compromise users with malware disguised as pro-Ukraine cyber tools".
- ↑ "Disbalancer - cyber security analytics company | Best DDoS attack protection". disbalancer.com.
- ↑ "disBalancer services: Cybersecurity and DDoS protection provider". disbalancer.com.
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