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U.S. Warns of Possible Cyber Biz Attack
mikesd81 writes "The AP has an article about a possible attack against the New York Stock Exchange via the internet by a radical muslim group. The notice was issued to the U.S. cybersecurity industry after officials saw a posting on a 'Jihadist Web site' calling for an attack on U.S. Internet-based stock market and banking sites in December, said Homeland Security Department spokesman Russ Knocke. Knocke has said: 'There is no information corroborating the threat and that the alert was issued as a routine matter and out of an abundance of caution.' There is no immediate threat to our homeland at this time. The attacks were to be conducted in December, 'until the infidel new year,' the site said, according to a U.S. government translation. It called for attackers to use viruses that can penetrate Internet sites and destroy data stored there. Spokespeople for the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq declined to comment on the cyber-terror threat."
seriously, is this new?
So, some joker on some website posts a piece about how people should release viruses to attack the stock exchange ... and our government issues an alert?
What happens when the same joker posts a call for nano-viruses to be released into our water supply to create a generation of flesh eating mutants from our own children?!?
Seriously, you deal with terrorism by NOT being afraid.
You do NOT deal with it by hyping every single fantasy that they can post.
The news articles I have seen, read and heard all said there was "No Credible Evidence" that this was a real threat.
Save for the one slashdot finds and posts..
I think we can largely take people who annoce these things before hand, its just like foreplay for them. They want the media to report on it (which they do - handy really) and they want people to know that they are considering doing it. Its just another tool for spreading fear, uncertainty and doubt.
Besides don't you think there could be a certain amount of l33t points (or some kind of jihad alternative) for saying your going to do an attack and them still being un-able to stop you... I'm assuming this will be like a DoS attack or what have you from bot-nets; does this mean running an unpatched copy of XP is helping the terrorists?
*''I can't believe it's not a hyperlink.''
The intent of terrorists is to incite terror in order to bring about change. Terror can be spread without any actual attack. Just the fact that the government and companies are responding to a threat, plus the spread of this information through media, increases fear. Since we are listening the terrorists are successful to some extent, even without actually committing the cyber-attack.
Developers: We can use your help.
It's almost impossible that a bunch of radicalists with relatively sophomoric computer skills could infiltrate the NYSE or the Nasdaq in any substantial way. This is akin to high schoolers joking on forums and IRC that they are going to hack into the school's computers and change grades. Sure it happens, but not typically by a bunch of attention-seeking kids, but usually by some kid that is smart enough he didn't need to do it, just wanted to see "if he can".
If these "hackers" really had a chance to impact the exchanges, it means they've found a vulnerability that the exchanges don't know about. Any smart (but malicious) hacker wouldn't tip their hand to such a find, they'd wait until D-day to launch their attack. Obviously the security folks at the exchanges should take the threat seriously and evaluate their systems for holes, but it would be bordering on the ridiculous for the rest of us to be worried.
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I wish them the best of luck, because their attack is an exercise in futility.
Let's stop underestimating the Enemy and thinking the DHS is just a bunch of foolish baboons, OK? Maybe they know something we don't, eh?
This group would definitely need somebody working on the inside to do any real damage.
This seems neither unlikely nor improbable given Al Qu'e'da's facination with Wall Street and the amount of time since the attack on the World Trade Center.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
but if they never commit the attack then people will no long belive them next time... I think they do need to at least have a go at it. Although you are right on the whole that the fear is a big part. I think with the brand of "islamic" terrorism though there maybe some part which requires an actual attack - maybe because of a percieved need to hurt someone or something, maybe because of the instruction from the people at the top.
Basically, I agree. But maybe they do want to do it aswell.
*''I can't believe it's not a hyperlink.''
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I really think the icing on the cake recently was Gingrich telling a group of Free Speech Advocates that free speech needs to be less free because ass-hat terrorists are getting on the net and collaborating. I mean, really, restricting internet access will certainly solve the problem.......sheesh...What an ignorant ass...
When you get punched in the noce you have 2 choices, punch back and continue punching until the threat is GONE, or do nothing and accept the fact that it will continue to happen regardless of what action you take.
Bullshit. The world is not black and white and neither are your options.
Got punched in the face? Analyze the situation, figure out why you got punched in the face and take a-p-r-o-p-r-i-a-t-e action to reduce the chance of it happening again to an acceptable level. Maybe that means killing the guy punching you. Maybe it means using a different swing on the playground. Maybe it just means kicking the guy in the nads. Maybe it means calling your older brother over to intimidate the guy.
Whatever the case, your simplistic analogy has no place in the real world.
Make your choice, stick by it, and shut the hell up.
Yeah, because changing your mind in response to new information is just not macho. Grow up pequito.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Has it occured to anyone that whoever made this threat is a terrorist equivalent of a pointy-headed-boss/marketing exec who is exhorting unknown terrorist hacker-types to unleash one of those virus thingies that he's heard about? Like, they sat in a meeting in some coffee house and said "Yeah! We could release one of those virus thingies! We'd rule the world! Get one of those computer infidels on the internets!"
Isn't this the equivalent of a pathetic "release the hounds," only there are no hounds, and the "leadership" doesn't know that?
Oh, and to religious extremists, isn't technology part of the global, modernistic infidelity?
I mean, really. After 50 years of being immersed in computing, STILL NO NON-TECHNICAL PEOPLE UNDERSTAND HOW COMPUTERS WORK and yet they STILL TELL geeks to do the IMPOSSIBLE.
What's next? A Koran that can fly and spits dates?
I, for one, am sick and tired of our moron overlords.
At risk of violating some sort of Godwin's-Law like rule for making 9/11 analogies, doesn't what you're saying sound a bit like someone sitting around on Sept. 10, 2001 saying "With a little bit of thought, the terrorists could set off car bombs in front of a bunch of major airports and totally screw up air travel? Since they cannot accomplish even that minor task, they don't have the skills to accomplish a major attack."
I think you're leaving out a major psychological motivator: the terrorists in large part aren't satisfied by and don't want just small, anonymous, disruptive attacks; they want large, public, anything-but-anonymous disruptive attacks.
Messing around with spreadsheet numbers would probably seem like a computer glitch. While its effects might actually be more crippling to the United States economy than taking out the NYSE for an afternoon (just like there are a lot of other physical-terrorism scenarios that would have been even more disruptive to the U.S. than destroying the WTC), that doesn't mean that they're as attractive to a potential terrorist.
I'm not sure if a lack of small-scale attacks really indicates that the enemy is incapable of larger ones; I think that's a terribly dangerous assumption to make. All the lack of smaller attacks means is that we have no idea what their capabilities are, and need to protect ourselves on all fronts.
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