Ukraine’s state-owned railway company, Ukrzaliznytsia, reported that despite a cyberattack that knocked out its online ticketing system, rail traffic remained uninterrupted. The company quickly switched to backup systems, ensuring that trains continued operating without delay.
Oleksandr Pertsovskyi, the board chairman of Ukrzaliznytsia, stated on national TV, “Operational traffic did not stop for a single moment. The enemy attack was aimed to stop trains, but we quickly switched to backup systems.” While the company did not explicitly name the perpetrators, the reference to "the enemy" pointed to Russia, which has regularly targeted Ukraine’s railway infrastructure since its full-scale invasion in 2022.
A Ukrainian security official, speaking anonymously, suggested that Moscow's goal was to create psychological pressure on the Ukrainian population and destabilize the country’s social and political situation through cyberattacks.
The attack, first reported on Sunday, caused a failure in the company’s IT system. Passengers were advised to buy tickets on-site or aboard trains as work to restore the online system continued. The cyberattack was described by Ukrzaliznytsia as "systemic, non-trivial, and multi-level" in a post on Telegram.
At Kyiv's central station, long queues formed as people waited to purchase tickets for travel, with ticket offices offering tickets only for journeys until Tuesday.
Since the Russian invasion in 2022 and the closure of Ukraine’s airspace, trains have become the primary mode of transportation for both domestic and international travel. Railways are also vital for the transportation of weapons and military supplies. In 2024, Ukrzaliznytsia carried approximately 20 million passengers and 148 million tonnes of freight, according to Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Oleksiy Kuleba.
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