(CNN)A high-volume cyberattack that temporarily blocked access to the websites of Ukrainian defense agencies and banks on Tuesday was "the largest [such attack] in the history of Ukraine," according to a government minister.
Speaking at a press conference Wednesday, Ukrainian Minister of Digital Transformation of Ukraine Mykhailo Fedorov added that it is too early to tell who was responsible for the attack.
The so-called distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack -- which bombarded Ukrainian websites with phony traffic -- was coordinated and well planned, officials said.
DDoS attacks often disrupt access to IT systems, but their impact can be more psychological rather than having any direct effect on a country's critical infrastructure.
While down for parts of Tuesday, the websites of Ukraine's Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces, and those of two prominent banks, were back up Wednesday, according to CNN journalists in Ukraine. The DDoS attack, however, is ongoing, Ukrainian officials said.
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Ukrainian service members walk on an armored fighting vehicle during a training exercise in eastern Ukraine's Donetsk region on Thursday, February 10.
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US Army troops walk on the tarmac at the Rzeszów-Jasionka Airport in southeastern Poland on Wednesday, February 16. US paratroopers landed in Poland as part of a deployment of several thousand sent to bolster NATO's eastern flank in response to tensions with Russia.
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A 200-meter-long Ukrainian flag is unfolded at the Olympic stadium in Kyiv, Ukraine, on February 16 to mark a "Day of Unity," an impromptu celebration declared by President Volodymyr Zelensky.
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Children play on old Soviet tanks in front of the the Motherland Monument in Kyiv on February 16.
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A Ukrainian serviceman carries an anti-tank weapon during an exercise in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine on Tuesday, February 15.
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Travelers wait in line to check in to their departing flights on February 15, at the Boryspil International Airport outside Kyiv, Ukraine. US President Joe Biden has urged Americans in Ukraine to leave the country, warning that "things could go crazy quickly" in the region.
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A location of Oschadbank, a state-owned bank, is seen in Kyiv on February 15. The websites of Ukraine's defense ministry and army, as well as the interfaces of the country's two largest banks, were hit by cyberattacks, according to Ukrainian government agencies.
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Ukrainian service members talk at a front-line position in eastern Ukraine on Monday, February 14.
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A woman and child walk underneath a military monument in Senkivka, Ukraine, on February 14. It's on the outskirts of the Three Sisters border crossing between Ukraine, Russia and Belarus.
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F/A-18E and 18F Super Hornets are seen on the flight deck of the USS Harry S. Truman, an American aircraft carrier in the Adriatic Sea on February 14. The Truman was on its way to the Middle East in mid-December, but the Pentagon decided to keep it in Europe as tensions began to escalate.
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Members of Ukraine's National Guard look out a window as they ride a bus through the capital of Kyiv on February 14.
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Satellite images taken on Sunday, February 13, by Maxar Technologies reveal that dozens of helicopters have appeared at a previously vacant airbase in Russian-occupied Crimea.
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The Russian navy's diesel-electric Kilo-class submarine, Rostov-on-Don, moves through Turkey's Bosphorus Strait en route to the Black Sea on February 13.
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US soldiers and military vehicles are seen at a military airport in Mielec, Poland, on Saturday, February 12. The White House approved a plan for the nearly 2,000 US troops in Poland to help Americans who may try to evacuate Ukraine if Russia invades, according to two US officials familiar with the matter.
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An anti-war demonstration takes place in Kyiv's Independence Square on February 12.
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Ukrainians attend a military training session for civilians in Kyiv on February 12.
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Pro-Russian separatists observe the movement of Ukrainian troops from trenches in Ukraine's Donbas area on Friday, February 11.
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Ukrainian service members unpack Javelin anti-tank missiles that were delivered to Kyiv on Thursday, February 10, as part of a US military support package for Ukraine.
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The incident comes as Russia has massed an estimated 150,000 troops close to Ukraine's border, according to US President Joe Biden, and as US officials warn that a fresh Russian invasion could come at any time. Russia has denied it is planning to invade Ukraine.
The US government is investigating the cyberattack on Ukrainian websites, a top State Department official said Wednesday, while suggesting that Russia has a history of carrying out such hacks.
"But who is best at this, who uses this weapon all around the world? Obviously, the Kremlin," Undersecretary of State Toria Nuland said on CBS This Morning.
"While we're still investigating and doing forensics along with the Ukrainians, I think what's most important is that these cyberattacks were not very successful," Nuland said. She credited Ukrainian officials for responding quickly and helping the websites recover.
Internet traffic hitting Ukrainian websites during the DDoS attack was "three orders of magnitude more than regularly observed traffic," according to data collected by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike.
Ninety-nine percent of the traffic involved a type of digital request to computer servers, "indicating the attackers were attempting to overwhelm Ukrainian servers," said Adam Meyers, CrowdStrike's senior vice president of intelligence.
A Ukrainian intelligence report recently obtained by CNN pointed to Russia's effort to destabilize "Ukraine's internal situation by using economic, energy, information, cyber, social, ethnic, and other tools."
Ukraine has concluded that Russia and Belarus were responsible for a separate cyberattack that hit government websites last month.
"As a result of a massive hacker attack on the night of January 14, 2022, the web pages of the Government of Ukraine" were shut down. The attacks were carried out by a group affiliated with the Russian and Belarusian special services," the Ukrainian intelligence report said.
Similarities in the infrastructure used in Tuesday's DDoS attack and the one last month suggest the incidents could be connected, Ukrainian officials said Wednesday.
In mid-January scores of Ukrainian government websites were targeted in a cyberattack with threatening text warning Ukrainians to "be afraid and wait for the worst," and alleging their personal information had been hacked.
Ukraine claimed Russia was most likely behind the attack, which affected the websites of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and a number of other government agencies.
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