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US, China Face Mutually Assured Destruction In Cyberwar
chicksdaddy writes with a tidbit from the RSA conference. From the article: "A panel of security and policy experts speaking at the RSA Conference in San Francisco on Wednesday said that, despite dire warnings about the information warfare capabilities of China and other developing nations, the risk of an all-out cyberwar is remote, and that the U.S. still holds many of the cards. Rather than trying to deliver a knock-out cyberwar capability, the U.S. should embrace the Cold War notions of containment and mutually assured destruction with advanced nations like China and Russia. Tried and true methods to win security from cyberattacks include international diplomacy, multilateral agreements that clarify the parameters for peaceful and hostile cyberactions and — of course — a strong offensive capability."
Old fashioned diplomatic horse trading will also be a critical tool for avoiding conflict and stemming the kinds of economic and military espionage that have become common in recent years.
As I stated above, I feel that the "economic and military espionage" is largely coming from one or two perpetrators. China will simply agree to everything, take the bargaining chip (whatever it is) from the US and then continue to play dumb.
In fact, the country's leaders are anxious to hear the opinions of U.S. policy experts on what an effective cyber war doctrine and policy should look like.
Right, right, "Excuse me, what are the rules so I know how to toe the line but still remain in good standing with the UN ... er, screw them, the WTO?"
This gem was really humorous:
"We as a nation know what steps we need to take to reduce our risk in cyber space," said Lewis of CSIS. "We may not want to, politically, but we know what those steps are."
A hot topic of conversation now within policy circles, cyber war is likely to end up as just another weapon in the arsenal of the U.S., China and other advanced nations, said Lewis. "People will figure out how to use it."
People will figure out how to use it? Now get off your lawn? Buddy if you can't take the time to pick up the paper or turn on CNN and watch 15-year olds downloading point'n'click bots to be a part of Anonymous, you don't deserve the title of "Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies." Let me assure you, people do know how to use it. Ragtag groups of teenagers roving the globe can band together and effectively use it. I'm sure governments aren't as ignorantly bumbling to catch up like they want us to believe.
My work here is dung.
Something makes me think that they will take the rest of us with them . . .
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Part of the problem with outsourcing all of our IT manufacturing is that we don't know what foreign agencies can kill with a single switch. It's only a part mind you, but enough that we in the US should be severely concerned with. No matter how good our hacking staff is, if the hardware they are hacking on is killed from a remote location.. well.. that pretty much ends the game.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Are we heading toward a cyberwar with real casualties, like this?
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Whatever makes the warmongers in congress happy.
At least this way we're not sending young men to die needlessly.
What do I know, I'm just an idiot, right?
If an attack does come from overseas, just turn off the pipes (power off whatever devices the physical undersea fibers connect to). The problem with this is that they are likely setting up a massive botnet within the target country that cannot be blocked by such a method. And we do see that the government tends to not care to shut down botnets, even now.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Trivially, an attack can be stopped or at least contained by simply pulling the network plug. I can't envision a scenario where we'd "lose the internet". We might lose connectivity to some areas for awhile, but it's not like there's some timed self-destruct code buried in Cisco firmware that could be activated en-masse.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Scenario A)
Total annihilation of all mankind, including most living organisms, with the world taking many centuries to slowly recover
Scenario B)
Facebooks r down
Idiots like these are the main reason Americans are so vulnerable to online threats.
I have written about why cyberwar is a false analogy, so mostly I will just repeat myself:
we both have the same to loose. So if China decides that they can get by with just their intranet then deterrence doesn't work. Especially since the stakes for the US and rest of the world would be total economic collapse. Also concerning is the less one side understands about the technological concepts and repercussions the more likely ether side is start a cyber war. and we all know our decision makers are crack technologists. A least nukes mean the total end of the physical world, where no one is likely to exactly know what would happen if we erased the virtual one.
All we have to do is screen out the Chinese Internet connections by Satellite and Cable and it will be like nothing happened.
You don't think all those "disused" satellites in orbit are dead, do you?
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
"Chinese hackers: No site is safe - CNN"
"Chinese hacking worries Pentagon"
"Pentagon hacked, Chinese Army suspected"
"China denies hacking Pentagon computers"
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Chinese networking and systems hardware isn't "Made In America".
blindly antisocialist = antisocial