submit a 3- to 5-page paper (750 to 1300 words) analyzing the case you have chos
ID: 3734282 • Letter: S
Question
submit a 3- to 5-page paper (750 to 1300 words) analyzing the case you have chosen, including your prognosis, prescription, and proscription.
WikiLeaks: Case Study for Cyberwar?
Case information:
WikiLeaks: Case Study for Cyberwar?
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
One of the problems of trying to understand cyberwar is that we don't really know what it looks like or how it behaves. Mostly, this is due to the fact that the participants/victims don't report it.
If anything is reported, it is heavily skewed or filtered for political purposes. Ironically, the situation surrounding the massive WikiLeaks releases may be the very thing people need to consider what cyberwar looks like. Consider the following:
1. WikiLeaks uses electronic means to get its information. In many cases, it is patently illegal to procure, possess or publish the documents they have, all higher morality arguments aside.
People would call for prosecution of State Department officials if Russia announced they had all this information. Why would it be any different for a non-government organization?
At very least, WikiLeaks is a high value target for cyberwar operations, if not an actual weapons platform in a cyber campaign.
2. WikiLeaks' assets are all over the globe and can migrate with lightning speed to anywhere. It took days to apprehend WikiLeaks' leader. The web site's contents changed hosts multiple times and is almost impossible to take down.
Any attempts to suppress it also affected innocent web sites. This kind of warfare is much closer to insurgency to conventional warfare.
3. There are lots of mercenaries on both sides. Some sympathize with one side or the other. It's quite possible that there are some paid or otherwise "attached" elements in the fray as well.
What began with web sites to raise money for legal defense led to DDOS attacks on not only those sites but organizations that processed payments related to the cause.
These hacks and attacks go on, despite the fact that they are technically illegal in many countries. History is replete with lessons in combatting--and retaining--mercenaries.
4. There is a lot of bad intelligence. EveryDNS was the host/DNS provider at one time for WikiLeaks, yet EasyDNS was targeted because it was mistakenly attributed in press accounts. Professional militaries are used to the "fog of war," but most Western societies (and many of their leaders) are not.
In addition, they generally have a low tolerance for mistakes. Unfortunately, many of the participants are not as highly skilled at dealing with the fog of war as professional military organizations.
5. Compared to conventional arms, WikiLeaks (and their attackers) require very few people, assets or resources to operate. In addition to the flexibility and survivability mentioned above, it's very cheap to support significant operations.
The technology and expertise has spread to many nations so lots of groups can be members of the "cyber club." Unfortunately, many don't have the legal or ethical restraints to which the current world order is accustomed.
6. The heart of the conflict doesn't directly involve nations, but rather groups that aren't national in character. WikiLeaks itself is a company and many of the partisans are individuals, small groups or transnational organizations.
The most obvious national player is the US government, but it is largely taking a deliberate strategy, using lawyers and law enforcement agencies rather than direct action, cyber activities.
Unlike many previous cyberwar activities--Georgia and Estonia come to mind--the activities surrounding WikiLeaks don't have conventional or direct national political components. This makes it a unique conflict, which might allow us to study a more pure cyber conflict.
Explanation / Answer
War is a word which makes us to think of missiles , fight, weapons .then what does cyber war means ?cyber war is a digital war .imagine a future where wars are fought not with bombs and bullets but computer viruses and pacemaker shutdowns?in today's era, whatever work we are doing most of that is digital ,it is done online .every other work is connected to directly or indirectly to internet . and with the time use of internet is increasing day by day .people are coming up with various online businesses .organizations preferto keep their data online ,like to process lots of work online. lots of different social sites are coming up every other day and earning money online with lots of sucess and ease .so this makes people to go digital . as it adds flexibility , efficiency and profit to their work .
but along with all the merits of cyber . there are few threats /demerits of using internet which harms the organization or individual .this is connected to cyber wars.
for example in previous time soldieres used to fight on borders if they want to destroy other country they had to kill that country solders but today .if any country want to destroy other country they just need to make attack on computers of that other country .then all computers will get jammed and their business etc will automatically suffer .they will loose their data .hence automatically harming financially to that country . by breaking their securities.for example bonatware Ransomware which destroyed and shutted down so many big industries ,hospitals of u.k.
then other ransomware delets the data and the major problem is it is very hard to know about source of that ransomware .from where it came .
there are so many ways by which it is done
these wars are called cyber wars .according to united nations cyber security record india is on 25th record .as india is getting digital very fastly so there is need to protect personal data
prognosis, prescription, and proscription. of cyber wars :
so if every citizen of every country start taking these basics steps then in case of cyber attack or in time of cyber wars that country will be least affective
case : in 2009 a hacker stole millions of credit card details who was from miami.it was biggest fraud case in united states.these details were out of 250 financial institutions . so these kinds of cases lead to biggest loss for any country as hacker can steal information and steal their money . preventive steps canbe :
this is final (ANS)
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