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Is Cyberwarfare Fiction?
An anonymous reader writes "In response to calls by Russia and the UN for a 'cyberwarfare arms limitation treaty,' this article explains that 'cyberwar' and 'cyberweapons' are fiction. The conflicts between nation states in cyberspace are nothing like warfare, and the tools hackers use are nothing like weapons. Putting 'cyber' in front of something is just a way for people to grasp technical concepts. The analogies quickly break down, and are useless when taken too far (such as a 'cyber disarmament treaty').'"
Dick Cheney for one. The only real hearts he has are the ones hes eaten.
When millions of people in key positions have artificial hearts, limbs, microchips in their body, nanotechnology with RFID in their clothes, then cyberwarfare becomes something physical.
It's times like this that I really wish I hadn't spent all that money in the 1990s on Internet-enabled toasters... My bagel came out overcooked this morning and I just know it was because of cyber-warfare!
Bow-ties are cool.
Mwahahahaha!
Take That!!!
The world is how you make it
"Many large power plants need quite a bit of energy to jump start from an 'off' condition"
Coal fired plants maybe. Pretty much everything else just requires someone to press an on button. Gas turbines are easy to start, nuclear never really goes off even with the rods in and hydro is as simple as opening the sluice gates.
You are years behind. Pacemakers with remote connectivity began being installed in 1999 and DefCon addressed the issue back in '08.
http://venturebeat.com/2008/08/08/defcon-excuse-me-while-i-turn-off-your-pacemaker/
Welcome to a brave new world, one where your pacemaker can be disabled or instructed to deliver a fatal shock to your heart...remotely.
Maybe, but probably not: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siberian_pipeline_sabotage#Hoax.3F
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
Printing up counterfeit currency during WW2 by the Germans to destabilize Britain's currency certainly was part of the war and pieces of paper certainly aren't weapons in the killing and blowing up of things. They certainly are weapons in the sense of destroying the economy. So from that point of view any cyber attacks which aid in destabilizing the economy could be part of a war and would be weapons.
As far as there being some sort of treaty to prevent this, that's probably the most stupid thing I have ever heard of. It sounds like people are making things up to either create jobs or keep them. Just another waste of money and time by the useless UN.
Nuclear plants won't run without an external power source. It's a safety feature. If the plant can't get power from the grid, the reactor shuts down automatically.
Sir –
You're right that nuclear power plants need external power to operate as a safety feature - to keep the water pump providing coolant flowing so the reactor doesn't melt. However, the need to be connected to the grid differs from my experience working at nuclear power plants. At the plant I worked at (a CANDU reactor) if the reactor itself wasn't operational there was a grid-backup, a diesel backup, and a battery backup. The battery was the most impressive. The plant could be started and was designed to operate with any of these sources of power at any given time. Of course, other plants may have different, less redundant, designs — as you suggest.
You might lead the casual reader to think that merely throwing a switch has no real world consequences, which is anything but the truth. When you are dealing with systems of such magnitude of energies even the smallest delay in rectifying an issue has a very lasting effect. e.g http://englishrussia.com/index.php/2009/08/17/hydro-electic-power-plant-explosion/ There are any number of ways to force mechanical failures simply by using 'control' software. Any mechanical system can be forced to fail if you know how it is built, and what problems plague the internal design of that system. The US is vulnerable to many such attacks against the control systems (e.g. SCADA ) and these threats should be taken VERY seriously until such time that we know the internal control networks are unreachable from any outside influence. http://www.securityfocus.com/news/11465