Russian government hackers said that it recently carried out multiple cyber espionage operations targeting countries allied with Ukraine since its February invasion.

Microsoft said this in a report on Wednesday, illustrating the scale of Moscow’s ongoing hacking activities.

“The cyber aspects of the current war extend far beyond Ukraine and reflect the unique nature of cyberspace,’’ Microsoft President Brad Smith said in the report.

Meanwhile, researchers had already traced a series of destructive cyber attacks on Ukrainian entities to Russian state-backed hacking groups since the conflict began.

They had now found that 128 organisations in 42 countries outside Ukraine were also targeted by the same groups in stealthy, espionage focused hacks, according to the report.

However, many of these recent intrusion efforts were aimed at the U.S., Microsoft researchers wrote, but several member countries of the military alliance NATO, which has provided critical support to Ukraine amid the conflict, were hit too.

Reuters