The Real Impact of the Estonian Cyberattack

An anonymous reader writes "News.com offers up an interview with Arbor Networks' senior security researcher Jose Nazario. He takes stock of the denial-of-service attack against the Baltic nation of Estonia, and considers the somewhat disturbing wider implications from the event. 'You look around the globe, and there's basically no limit to the amount of skirmishes between well-connected countries that could get incredibly emotional for the population at large. In this case, it has disrupted the Estonian government's ability to work online, it has disrupted a lot of its resources and attention. In that respect, it's been effective. It hasn't brought the government to a crippling halt, but has essentially been effective as a protest tool. People will probably look at this and say, That works. I think we're going to continue to do this kind of thing. Depending on the target within the government, it could be very visible, or it could not be very visible.'"

Comments

How insightful!

[Cutie Pi]

Depending on the target within the government, it could be very visible, or it could not be very visible.

Yep, that pretty much sums up the possible outcomes.

Re:Multicast theories

[zappepcs]

While I'm not sure your idea would work or not, I do know that there are many ways to compromise the nice-play Internet that we all think it is. Some of them are being used right now and we just haven't figured it out yet. DDoS is but one of those ways and might be *ONLY* a distraction while surreptitious malware or spyware is installed in government facilities. This in fact could be a test of the new Chinese cyber-warfare units in order to demonstrate what they are capable of...

Just a thought from the 'stay in your happy place group' (TM)