Cyber warfare - virtual battles in reality
13-16 November of this year, NATO conducted an exercise called Cyber Coalition, during which the member states of the bloc will have to work out interaction in the event of cyber warfare. By the way, many states are busy planning cyber attacks. But in these cyber attacks there is one extremely serious problem: it is impossible to foresee their consequences in advance. In addition, it is also impossible to control the preparations for cyber war.
According to the scenario of the exercise, the two countries participating in the military bloc will be subjected to a hacker attack carried out by one of the African countries. The “affected” states will be Estonia and Hungary. One of the military transport aircraft of NATO, which is disabled by a powerful computer virus, falls on one of the Hungarian cities. At the same time, there is also a ground attack on the infrastructure of another state, Estonia. The alliance itself determines which state the enemy belongs to, and strikes back not only in the real world, but also in the cybernetic one.
It should be noted that the choice of potential victims of hackers causes at least bewilderment, after all, both Hungary and Estonia are very close to Russia. That is why many of the experts say that it is the Russian Federation that is meant by the African state. Such an assumption seems quite acceptable, especially since representatives of the bloc name Russia, Iran and China among their most likely opponents.
It is worth noting that the participants of the bloc take the problems of cyber security very seriously. Thus, in particular, since the end of 2011, the German armed forces have been in a state of full combat readiness to conduct cyber warfare since the end of the year. A unit that specializes in cyberwarfare is stationed near Bonn. The creation of the unit was started back in 2006, and it was based on computer experts who were responsible for protecting the computer system of the German military against hacker attacks. We note that in terms of training, German cyber warriors were almost equal in strength with American and Israeli specialists.
The UK is also not inactive. On the basis of DeMonfortov University, located in Leicester, a program for training specialists in programming for internal and external intelligence services, MI5 and MI6, was launched. In October of this year, the head of the British Foreign Office, William Hague, made a statement that young people who are actively involved in computer games are recruited to the program. According to him, they will be able to ensure the security of the country in the future.
Cyber warfare is virtual weapon, which over time can turn into a full-fledged weapon of mass destruction. Therefore, experts predict the start of the cyber war race between the leading states of the world. Evidence that the virtual and the real is already closely intertwined with each other, show recent events - the Arab Spring, censorship in China, cyber attacks in Iran, hacker attacks on security services servers, the publication of secret information by WikiLeaks. All this gives experts an excuse to say that cyberwar is already unfolding in the world. But while its participants are practicing, striking precise blows, but even such micro-operations indicate that cyber weapons can pose a serious threat.
The danger of using cyber-means is indicated, in particular, by repeated failures in the passenger check-in system at airports, as a result, a large number of flights were disrupted. Scandals associated with WikiLeaks, have caused hacker attacks on the network resources of the world's largest banks and ministries around the world, as well as on the New York Stock Exchange. But this is all, so to speak, the everyday use of cyber weapons. As for its global use, this is about undermining the work of the military system, mobile communications, transport and power plants.
As a prime example of the military use of cybertechnology, as a rule, storywhich occurred at the beginning of the new century with the notorious listening US-British system Echelon. In addition, there were still hacker attacks on US government servers, in which they accused either North Korean or Chinese hacker programmers. The most resonant case of our time is the use of the Stuxnet virus against Iranian nuclear systems. Iranian specialists managed to stop him, but another threat appeared - a virus program called Flame, which is very similar to the previous one.
According to expert on competitive intelligence, Yevgeny Yushchuk, it is these cases that indicate the direction in which the development of computer weapons is moving.
The involvement in the creation of these computer viruses is denied by both Washington and the Israeli side, but it is quite obvious that these are just political games. According to many experts, it is ineffective to fight with cybernetic weapons against Tehran. Only a small and swift victorious war will help here. However, with Iran, a small war will not work, and a big victorious one will not ...
In addition to the United States and NATO member countries, Japan, China, Russia and even North Korea have been very successful in mastering the potential for wars in cyberspace. According to experts, currently more than 20 states in the world have the potential to wage cyber wars. More accurately determine the number of such states is very difficult, because this area, as well as all developments related to it, are classified information.
China is recognized as the most active among all the above-mentioned states, which has separated itself from the rest of the world by the “Great Wall” and through it filters incoming and outgoing information. Chinese hackers are considered one of the strongest computer experts in the world. Moreover, questions on cybertechnologies are kept under the control of the highest political leadership of the country.
As for Russia, the military department is well aware of the potential of young people in the field of informatics and computer systems. Therefore, in October, a tender was announced for research in the field of information security. Moreover, according to reports of some publications, it is more and more often that “advanced” hackers have been recruited into power structures.
In the field of technical data protection, Russians also adhere to principles somewhat different from Western countries. So, in particular, at the facilities of the nuclear industry there is a system of local networks through which all information is transmitted, as well as the control of equipment. One of the local networks is integrated into the Internet, and the other is completely isolated. Something similar is observed in the computer system of the power department. No computer that contains sensitive information is connected to the Internet. Moreover, all computers that go to government departments are tested by special services for spyware, and the military sphere is completely deprived of foreign programs.
If we talk about the consequences that can be caused by a cybernetic attack, carried out intentionally or accidentally and directed at a hydroelectric power station, sewer system or other infrastructure, it is impossible to determine them. This can only be guessed at. But, according to experts, in the very near future, computer viruses will spread at a biological rate. At the same time, it will be impossible to control their distribution.
According to military analyst Alexander Golts, at the present time civilization is extremely vulnerable. This is explained by the fact that any complex process, including water supply systems, traffic control, infrastructure - everything is controlled with the help of information technology. And even the slightest disruption in the operation of these technologies can cause serious problems. He also notes that at the moment only initial work is underway to create cybernetic weapons. Despite this, there is even a whole special unit in America. A similar unit, by the way, exists in the Russian military department. In addition, Golts is confident that in the field of cyber weapon development the Russians have left the whole world far behind.
And according to Evgeny Kaspersky, the founder of the Kaspersky Lab, it is necessary to adopt an international agreement that either prohibits defense structures from developing viruses or will help reduce the perceived danger on a global scale. But in reality this is not such a simple task. In practice, the harmonization of international agreements on cyber security will lead to a restriction on the free use of the world wide web, since there you can find potentially dangerous developments.
Each state has its own concept of information security and freedom, so at present there are no chances to come to any general agreement that would restrain the developers of computer virus programs. Thus, it turns out that humanity simply turned out to be a hostage to cyberspace, which is neither predicted nor even more impossible to control.
Materials used:
http://rus.ruvr.ru/2012_11_12/Kibervojna-pole-bitvi-Zemlja/
http://rus.ruvr.ru/2012_10_01/Ot-jadernogo-k-kompjuternomu-gonka-kibervooruzhenij/
http://rus.ruvr.ru/2012_10_18/NATO-gotovitsja-k-kibervojne-s-Rossiej/
Information