Cyberattack on Ukraine's Kyivstar will cost parent Veon almost $100 million in sales

(Reuters) - Veon, the parent company of Ukraine's largest mobile operator Kyivstar, will take a hit of around 3.6 billion hryvnias ($95 million) in revenue in 2024 due to a massive cyberattack in December, the Dutch telecoms group estimated on Thursday.

The estimated lost revenue is associated with measures Kyivstar has taken to compensate customers for inconveniences caused by the disruptions, Veon said.

The cyberattack was the largest since Russia launched its war on Ukraine in February 2022, knocking out services including mobile phone, damaging IT infrastructure in several regions, and putting people at risk of not receiving air raid alerts.

VEON said it does not expect a material financial impact for its consolidated results for the year ended Dec 31. 2023, and instead will push the costs to the current year.

"Kyivstar plans to continue its remediation and compensation efforts in the coming months. The costs or loss of revenue of any other such remediation measures is uncertain and cannot be reasonably estimated at this time," Veon said in a statement.

(This story has been corrected to change the source to 'Veon' instead of 'Kyivstar,' in the headline and paragraph 1)

(Reporting by Nathan Vifflin; Editing by Andrew Heavens and Emelia Sithole-Matarise)