China accused of cyber-attacks on Ukraine before Russian invasion

China launched cyber-attacks on Ukrainian military and nuclear targets shortly before the Russian invasion, according to a report.

The claims are based on intelligence memos obtained by the Times. However, the Ukrainian security service denied on Friday night that it had supplied any information on the alleged attacks.

Jamie MacColl, a research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies, said the reported attempts appeared to fit a Chinese tactic of scanning for vulnerabilities in IT infrastructure, such as firewalls and virtual private networks.

The Times said a series of intelligence memos, thought to be prepared by another country, detailed the scale of the hacking and included nuclear targets, which allegedly peaked on 23 February, the day before the Russian invasion.