News: Supporting Private Sector Resilience in Ukraine through Cyber Threat Management

At the U.S.-Ukraine Reconstruction, Investment, and Innovation Forum on July 16th, we officially launched a new partnership that leverages Chemonics’ extensive experience supporting economic growth in Ukraine and Flare’s intuitive threat exposure management platform to support Ukraine’s cybersecurity resilience. 

Russian cyberwarfare operations against Ukraine were evident both before and during the war, with Ukraine’s private sector remaining highly susceptible to these threats. These operations specifically target and exploit Ukrainian critical infrastructure and business operations. For instance, Ukraine’s financial sector was a key target in the 2022 cyberattacks that preceded the Russian invasion. Attacks on the financial sector can cripple economic growth and lead to social unrest. Disabling IT services can severely hinder the nation’s ability to respond to cyber-attacks or maintain essential commercial and citizen services. Hijacking media and other public communication channels can be used to spread disinformation and propaganda.  

“At Flare, one of our core missions is to protect the infrastructure people rely on globally. Our initiative in Ukraine aims to reduce the risk of data breaches and ransomware attacks against Ukrainian critical infrastructure and humanitarian organizations,” says Flare’s Chief Technology Officer and Cofounder Mathieu Lavoie.

The new partnership will work closely with Ukrainian private sector firms to build the necessary skills and provide access to tools that enable these firms to effectively manage external cyber threats. Through our broad network within Ukraine’s business community, Chemonics will leverage relationships with targeted business organizations or associations in Ukraine to promote this initiative to suitable companies within their membership and stakeholder base. Flare will build the capacity of personnel of selected firms on cybersecurity needs and approaches to threat exposure prevention, management, and mitigation. 

“With our longstanding commitment to the people of Ukraine and global experience managing successful economic growth and reconstruction efforts worldwide, we are working to foster global partnerships that support Ukraine’s private sector resilience. Our collaboration with Flare will contribute to managing one of the most critical threats facing Ukraine today – cybersecurity,” notes Chemonics’ Senior Vice President for the Europe and Eurasia Region Tetyana Dudka.  

This partnership will enhance the confidence of Ukraine’s commercial partners to continue investment and trade with Ukraine, thereby safeguarding jobs and revenue for Ukrainians to support their reconstruction efforts.  

For more information about this initiative, see this fact sheet.