Brilliant Article: 'The ‘cyber war’ era began long ago' | From Security Affairs

By Ron Kelson, Pierluigi Paganini, Benjamin Gittins, David Pace

US military strategist John Boyd states:

“War comprises acts of physical, biological, psychological, social, cultural and other destruction at all levels, for example, intrapsychic, interpersonal, intergroup, interorganisational, and international.”

Cyber warfare is combat in cyberspace and includes computers, the Internet and the “sphere of human thought” (Noosphere, Social Media). Cyber operations can be Kinetic (physical destruction) and Non-Kinetic (attacks against computers, intellectual property, financial systems, and the realm of ideas, opinions, beliefs and feelings). The boundaries between conventional operations (munitions, psychological) and cyber-operations is blurring, as cyber attacks begin to be used as a force multiplier in conventional operations.

Cyber warfare is generally different from cybercrime, with cybercrime seen as financially motivated, and cyber warfare as politically motivated. Cyber attacks that result in physical destruction of critical infrastructure or large loss of life are considered acts of war/terrorism. Cyber attacks can originate or be triggered from anywhere. Cyber warfare can be conducted by traditional nation-states and other actors. Paradoxically, cyber warfare can, and already does, take place during “peacetime” periods when there is no conventional conflict occurring.

In recent years, the use of technological tools for military operations has increased significantly. Countries such as the USA, China, Israel and Russia, were the first to invest significantly in building cyber warfare capabilities. Today it is claimed that at least 140 countries are developing cyber weapons, which are seen as covert and highly cost effective. Not surprisingly, the number of cyber warfare operations has increased substantially. Every day there are thousands of attacks against government systems around the world due to offensive foreign states. Vast amounts of information are being stolen and time-delayed kinetic attacks are being installed in critical infrastructures. Predominantly, non-kinetic attacks still cause real damage and are still ‘war’.

What are the main types of cyber warfare attacks?

Offensive attacks for sabotage: The primary purpose of these kinds of operations is to destroy the target, typically critical infrastructure such as communication systems, power grids or transportation infrastructures. Economic systems are also key targets. For example, several stock markets have been attacked by foreign countries, as happened to the Israeli Tel Aviv stock exchange at the start of 2012.

Stuxnet malware is the best-known example of a cyber weapon (widely believed to be) developed by US and Israeli intelligence agencies. It is designed to sabotage the Iranian nuclear industry by attacking nuclear sites that were advancing their uranium enrichment programme.

Cyber espionage: The act of information gathering to obtain sensitive, proprietary or classified information from individuals and governments also for military, political, or economic advantage using illegal exploitation methods on the internet, networks, software and/or computers.

There are different types of cyber espionage depending on the scheme adopted to steal classified information that is not handled securely. The attacks could be conducted using malware to spy on victim systems, or by introducing/exploiting backdoors in software or hardware. Recently, one of the main concerns regarding the cyber espionage are the attacks to gather information through social networks. These platforms are a rich mine of information that could advantage an attacker, and the acquired data could represent a preparatory phase to a major (conventional) offensive……

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Brilliant Article: 'The ‘cyber war’ era began long ago' | From Security Affairs