According to the chief of US Cyber Command, offensive actions in support of Ukraine have been carried out by US military hackers.

General Paul Nakasone also detailed how separate “hunt forward” operations allowed the US to track down foreign hackers and identify their tools before they were used against the US in an exclusive interview.

The general, who is also the director of the National Security Agency (NSA), told that he is concerned “every single day” about the threat of a Russian cyber attack on the US, and that the hunt forward activities were an effective way of protecting both America and its allies.

For the first time, General Nakasone stated that the US was conducting offensive hacking activities in support of Ukraine in the aftermath of the Russian invasion.

He told, “We’ve conducted a series of operations across the full spectrum; offensive, defensive, [and] information operations.”

The four-star general did not go into detail about the actions, but highlighted how they were legal, carried out with full civilian oversight of the military and in accordance with Department of Defense policy.

“My job is to provide a series of options to the secretary of defense and the president, and so that’s what I do,” he said.

However, he pointed out that, unlike Russia, which starts its media operations with a falsehood, the US strives to strategically reveal the truth.

The FBI received this intelligence from Cyber Command and the NSA, which served as “a flashlight that suddenly reveals this type of nefarious behavior.”

This strategic disclosure has been in the works since 2018, according to General Nakasone, and has influenced the Western response to Ukraine’s incursion.