Zelensky Officially Dismisses SBU Head of Cybersecurity Following a Series of Scandals

Ilya Vityuk, former head of cybersecurity at the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), was dismissed officially on Wednesday by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as per a Presidential Decree.

Prior to his dismissal, Vityuk was suspended from his duty by the head of SBU after he was engulfed in a series of scandals in recent weeks, where SBU press service said Vityuk was sent to the front for “combat missions” following his suspension as the head of cybersecurity.

The scandals started when investigative journalists from Slidstva.Info discovered he and his family possess luxurious assets that do not correspond to their official income.

Before publishing the investigation on April 4, journalist Yevhen Shkurat was served military summons in a shopping mall by military commission officers instructed by an SBU employee, as mall footage revealed. Slidstva.Info also said they were warned of publishing the investigations.

After Vityuk’s suspension, Slidstvo.info also published another investigation that showed Vityuk, then an SBU operative, filming the Berkut riot police firing at protestors during the Euromaidan in 2014, whose identity and presence were confirmed by the Prosecutor General’s office and Serhiy Horbatyuk, the former head of the Maidan crime investigation department.

It was revealed that Vityuk was questioned for his involvement in 2019, where he said he lost the video and did not recognize any of the riot police officers.

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The Berkut unit was disbanded following the revolution due to its brutal methods used against protestors, which led to the death of more than a hundred people.

Before his dismissal, Vityuk was one of the more high-profile officials from the SBU and led the investigation on December’s Kyivstar hack, one of the largest Russian cyberattacks against Ukraine to date which rendered internet inaccessible to thousands of Ukrainians.