Even if Russian hackers don’t directly set their sights on US entities, Ukraine’s dependence on foreign technology can pose big problems for the United States, according to Lin.

“For example, Ukraine doesn’t have its own spy satellites, so where does it get its spy imagery? It gets it from commercial satellites,” Lin said, with some of the companies behind those commercial satellites potentially located in the United States. “That’s an obvious place you would expect Russian cyberattacks to be targeted. And that’s just one example of what could be possible.”

Should the conflict in Ukraine escalate further, Lin added, “all the stuff in the United States that directly helps the Ukrainian military machine… becomes fair game for the Russians to target.”