Cyber Warfare – A critical summary of the Blog and an overview

My opening blog argued that cyberwarfare has been affecting the World for some time and is here to stay.  It is evolving and history in the making, forever updating itself … not unlike one’s apple products.  Writing this blog on Cyberwarfare has been an enjoyable surprise, although some of my conclusions are profoundly worrying.  It has been enjoyable because it has been interesting; my early thoughts have been confirmed.  The surprise was threefold:  the amount of regular reporting by the media about cyberwarfare related matters; that inter-state cyberwarfare has been going on longer than I realised; and the unexpected directions some of my research took me.

My blog’s focus was intended to be on ‘state organised or sponsored cyberwarfare’.  It is not melodramatic to state that the world is now at war because, without doubt, nations are now waging silent, seemingly bloodless wars on one another (on one’s ‘allies’ even) via the medium of the internet and cyberspace.  Crucially there is an unstated ‘Cold War’ ongoing between the major nations of the world and, with it, a digital arms race seeking to exploit data.  My blogs have covered cyber incidents involving Russia, China, the USA and surprisingly, yet unsurprisingly, Britain.  In October alone the US had nine significant cyber incidents (which we know about), some of which I covered in my blogs, the list of which I have provided below along with a link for the whole list dating back to 2006.  NATO is currently operating its biggest ‘cyber warfare exercise’ in Estonia (one of Russia’s many neighbours) after a year of attacks on ‘sports bodies, the U.S. Democratic Party and the world chemical weapons watchdog in the Netherlands’, by the Kremlin or Russian linked hacking groups.

https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/181101_Significant_Cyber_Events_List.pdf?hsZtm10X2Ery9_CD.a2FYbE6ti..tQuu

https://www.military.com/daily-news/2018/12/01/nato-tests-electronic-defenses-cyber-threat-grows.html

 

I put forward a definition and model of cyberwarfare, postulating that cyberwarfare encompasses both non-kinetic and kinetic warfare (without doubt it does).  I stand by my definition (Cyberwarfare is non-kinetic and kinetic warfare in cyberspace) and I would not make any significant change to the model as I believe it explains cyberwarfare well conceptually.  However, if I were to tackle the subject in more depth, the simplicity of this model would be too basic and it would need to include more sub-branches

Cyberwarfare – a simple model

 

As cyberwarfare evolves and the human race changes (declines in some respects), cyberwarfare using artificial intelligence and robotics will change the nature of kinetic warfare profoundly by potentially removing the human element from direct face-to-face combat.  Cyberwarfare is already the central, unifying means of conducting war and in the Clausewitzian sense is absolutely a means for the major world states to conduct war in order to achieve their political aims.  This ‘cyber fighting’ is unseen and ungoverned by the ethical rules of war as we know them.  If ‘all out’ war breaks out, attacks on Critical National Infrastructure (CNI) could make life a misery for large swathes of the human population, done in pursuit of political aims.  All of this took me to my most worrying conclusion, which is that liberal democracy as we know it and hold dear is threatened and could be a shell of itself in less than fifty years.  This could be the outcome of a cultural clash between China and the West.  China will use all means, including making full use of cyberspace, to achieve its strategic aim of political, social, economic and military dominance.

 

China’s intentions are outside the scope of this report, but cyber ethics are not.  The world is at a crossroads regarding cyberspace and thus cyber warfare.  Traditional warfare has the Geneva Convention to at least give the impression that warfare adheres to a set of basic rules.  Currently there is little to no internet oversight, with every attempt at regulation failing.  This means that nations can operate in cyberspace with almost no restrictions, allowing them to perpetrate attacks they could not necessarily commit if they were fighting a conventional, ‘old fashioned’, war.  Furthermore this detaches and desensitises humans conducting such wars, potentially making them less morally conscious about their cyber attacks.  Retaliating is not easy where there is no direct physical presence and electronic tracks can be covered.  Moreover it is significantly cheaper to use a computer to launch an attack than to use, say, an F-35 jet; the destructive impact of the jet could be less than that of a cyber attack on CNI.

 

A French official commented “The internet is a space currently managed by a technical community of private players.  But it’s not governed.  So now that half of humanity is online, we need to find new ways to organize the internet … Otherwise, the internet as we know it today — free, open and secure — will be damaged by the new threats.”  That is the conundrum: how to retain a free and open internet (a good thing) yet how to police attacks going on unseen in cyberspace?   More and more people (and more significantly, businesses, governments and their armies) are dependent on the internet to the point of no return to old ways of working and living lives, with scope for cyberattacks to become more ‘frequent, complex, destructive and coercive’.  I cannot see the World’s leaders talking about governing cyberwarfare, although over the past couple of months there have been several calls for internet reform or tighter cyber security.  The most notable calls both came in November 2018, coming from France and China, motivated by completely different reasons and neither gaining support from major powers such as the US or Russia.  Nothing is therefore likely to come of these proposals in the short term, but we have to hope that this will change in the long term.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-cyber/chinas-xi-calls-for-global-cooperation-to-create-fairer-internet-idUSKCN1NC0CG

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2018/11/12/us-russia-china-refuse-back-french-cybersecurity-initiative/

 

I therefore conclude that cyberwarfare as a means of conducting non-kinetic asymmetric warfare is now the norm and here to stay.  It is also changing the nature of kinetic warfare profoundly, possibly to the extent that kinetic warfare will become a sub-set of cyberwarfare.  Cyberwarfare’s legitimacy as a means of war has however yet to be established.

 

Webography:

 

Centre for Strategic & International Studies, Significant Cyber Incidents (2018),<https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/181101_Significant_Cyber_Events_List.pdf?hsZtm10X2Ery9_CD.a2FYbE6ti..tQuu> [accessed 03/12/2018]

Damon Wake, NATO Tests Electronic Defenses as Cyber Warfare Threat Grows (2018),<https://www.military.com/daily-news/2018/12/01/nato-tests-electronic-defenses-cyber-threat-grows.html> [accessed 03/12/2018]

Cate Cadell, China’s Xi calls for global cooperation to create ‘fairer’ internet (2018),<https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-cyber/chinas-xi-calls-for-global-cooperation-to-create-fairer-internet-idUSKCN1NC0CG> [accessed 03/12/2018]

Joseph Archer, US, Russia and China refuse to back French cybersecurity initiative (2018),<https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2018/11/12/us-russia-china-refuse-back-french-cybersecurity-initiative/> [accessed 03/12/2018]

 

 

 

 

 

Cyber Warfare – the end of Western democracy?

Were you aware that 2049 will be the Centenary of the establishment of the People’s Republic of China?  It had not occurred to me until now, but it is obvious when you think about it.  The reason for me asking the question will become clear.

On Saturday I read a brief report that the U.S. is asking its allies to stop using equipment made by Chinese technology giant Huawei.  I was not surprised given what I have learnt in preparing my recent blogs, immediately thinking that it follows a predictable pattern, but then my research took me into deeper and more worrying strategic geo-political territory.  My conclusion is that, potentially, Western democracy as we know it might be confined and restricted to a small number of countries, and Cyber Warfare will have played a part in creating this situation.  Let me take you through what I found out.

 

The Huawei saga

On 23^rd November the Wall Street Journal published an article under the headline ‘Washington Asks Allies to Drop Huawei – U.S. worried about potential Chinese meddling in 5G networks’ and reporting that ‘The U.S. government has initiated an extraordinary outreach campaign to foreign allies, trying to persuade wireless and internet providers in these countries to avoid telecommunications equipment from China’s Huawei Technologies Co.’   https://www.wsj.com/articles/washington-asks-allies-to-drop-huawei-1542965105?tesla=y&ns=prod/accounts-wsj

A wide range of other agencies picked up the report and this one by ITPro reported that this action by the U.S. government is ‘part of a broader “technological cold war” between US allies and China for control of an increasingly digitalised future, set to be vulnerable to over-surveillance and cyber attacks’.

https://www.itpro.co.uk/security/32433/us-gov-presses-allies-to-ditch-huawei

This report states ‘Huawei has long said it is an employee-owned company and isn’t beholden to any government, and has never used its equipment to spy on or sabotage other countries. It said its equipment is as safe as that of Western competitors, such as Finland’s Nokia Corp. and Sweden’s Ericsson, because all manufacturers share common supply lines. Huawei representatives didn’t provide comment on the U.S. government’s overseas outreach.’  https://www.business-standard.com/article/international/us-asks-allies-to-shun-china-s-huawei-due-to-cybersecurity-threats-118112300086_1.html

Well, that all made sense – superficially – but then I dug further.

 

Is this U.S. economic protectionism?

I found this CNBC article from 25^th February 2018.  In it Richard Yu, CEO of Huawei’s consumer business, ‘called the developments in the U.S. “ridiculous” and said that its rivals are playing politics.  “Our competitors are using some political way … to try to kick us out from the U.S. market but we have no issue at all. We are transparent … we are a leading high-tech, innovative company,” Yu said on Sunday. “But they cannot compete with us on product, on technology, on innovation, so they compete with us [using] politics.”

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/25/huawei-us-issues-rivals-using-politics-to-kick-it-out-of-us-richard-yu.html

Well, that makes sense too.  I would expect the Americans to behave that way to protect their own technological giants, indeed Huawei ‘…was banned from bidding for government contracts in 2014, after being labelled a national security threat in a congressional report two years earlier‘. Although it must also be noted that this has not stopped Huawei growing into the world’s second biggest smartphone supplier (surpassing Apple).

https://www.forbes.com/sites/marcochiappetta/2018/11/25/u-s-advises-allies-to-shun-huawei-telecom-equipment-citing-potential-cyberthreats/#43f987438aa8

This Forbes article from 11^th September 2018 reinforces my thinking that the U.S.’s recent action against Huawei is in fact not to do with security but economics.  The headline reads ‘The U.S.-China Trade War And Global Economic Dominance’.  Part of the article states this ‘Consequently, Trump’s trade war with China is really about blocking, or at least slowing down, China’s technology upgrade and its expanding global economic influence. Chinese investment in the tech sector in the U.S. has come under tougher scrutiny, and American government agencies are put on high alert against Chinese efforts in industrial espionage. The clause of protecting national security in the U.S. Trade Act of 1974 is increasingly invoked to impose new tariffs on Chinese imports and to curtail China’s business mergers and acquisitions in the U.S.’  https://www.forbes.com/sites/yuwahedrickwong/2018/09/11/the-u-s-china-trade-war-and-global-economic-dominance/#368cfbb7256a

This later article from Forbes on 18^th October 2018 opens with this point:  ‘Fears of China seem to grow every day – as an economic and technological rival as well as for its military prowess. One poll, sponsored by the firm Axios, found that almost two-thirds of Americans fear China’s growing economic power and that an only slightly smaller proportion fear its technological success. A recent gathering of prominent Silicon Valley venture capitalists expressed concern that by 2020 China will overtake the United States in the development of super computers and artificial intelligence, especially self-driving vehicles. Though there can be little doubt of China’s high ambitions and rapid progress, it would be a mistake, with apologies to George Patton, “to take council from our fears.” Realism requires more perspective.’  It is a measured article going on to say ‘It also helps to question if not doubt the motives of groups who warn of China’s technological prowess.’ and ‘It is not even apparent that Chinese technological gains would necessarily threaten the United States or its industry.’

https://www.forbes.com/sites/miltonezrati/2018/10/18/weighing-the-nations-fear-of-china/#4567a2854446

 

China’s strategic intentions

Well, what to make of that?  What is the truth about U.S. action against Huawei?  Security or economics?

I then stumbled across a long article published on 3^rd October 2018 by Bradley A. Thayer, Professor, University of Texas and  John  Friend, Visiting Scholar, University of Hawai’i, authors of ‘How China Sees the World: Han-Centrism and the Balance of Power in International Politics’.  Well, when I had finished reading it I was alarmed.  It predicts that ‘The world by 2049 will be defined by the realization of Chinese power’, that ‘By 2049, Western-led institutions will remain, but their liberal principles will be diluted by reforms required by Beijing’ and ‘If Xi’s “Dream” is realized, we can envision a world where by the mid-21st century, democratic governments survive in the West, but Beijing’s political model will have the upper hand in the international system. As with the Cold War, the struggle is material — economic and military power matter — but will also and ineluctably be ideological’.  https://thediplomat.com/2018/10/the-world-according-to-china/

Gulp!  This is my world.  In 2049 I will be 53 years old.  I really do hope the world does not turn out as the Thayer/Friend article predicts.

If you look at it from this, admittedly western, perspective, asking allies not to use Huawei products makes sense.

I should admit that I have an Apple iPhone.  It is made in China.  However, I will continue to use it.

Cyber Warfare – the end of human BOG?

This week’s blog connects a series of random news reports, my proposition being that whilst Cyber warfare will not end kinetic warfare, it may end direct human versus human combat.  Over the past couple of decades Western politicians have been fond of saying that a western intervention cannot be completed until there are ‘boots on the ground’ or BOG.  Well:

• Will we have the humans to put the BOG?
• Is it even necessary to have human BOG? Will future wars be fought by humans in Cyber armies at a distance with robot soldiers as the BOG?

There is an ever increasing amount of pessimistic reporting that the human race is declining physically, so let me start with Obesity.  If you were to google ‘Obesity is a national epidemic’, you would find reports stretching back at least a decade.  Look at this compelling and watchable TED talk by US Lieutenant General Mark Hertling from 2012, in which he convincingly argues why obesity is a national security issue:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWN13pKVp9s

Directly related to our ever increasing Obesity is our increasingly sedentary lifestyle.  Late last month Dr. Paul Clayton, of the Institute of Food, Brain and Behaviour at Oxford University, warned that Homo Sapiens had become Homo Sedensis, a species that no longer does enough exercise and physical activity to justify the number of calories humans need to support themselves nutritionally.  I could not help being amused by the description Homo Sedensis but, setting aside that the point of the article is that he is announcing the development of a super-supplement to tackle the problem, the sobering thought is that I get the point he is making.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2018/10/27/home-sapiens-have-become-homo-sedensis-warns-oxford-academic/ and https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6327415/Brits-homo-sedens-inactivity-claims-Oxford-University-academic.html

(I will now pause this blog to go out for a swim…!).

Compounding the problem is recruiting for the armed forces.  For over a year there has been a steady drip of reports that the UK’s armed forces are under-strength and struggling to recruit.  This article below by the Independent sums up the challenge:  “Nevertheless, that Britain is no longer able to fulfil its recruitment needs for the regular forces is symbolic of the country’s situation. With an ageing population – and, it should be said, relatively high employment levels – a career in the military is an attractive option for fewer people than it was in the past. Controversy over the UK’s involvement in recent conflicts in the Middle East may have made some potential recruits think twice too.”  https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/british-army-recruitment-brexit-foreign-commonwealth-military-defence-nhs-a8617911.html

Those conditions may change and recruiting may improve, but I cannot help thinking that this is a long-term trend when linked to obesity (unsuitable recruits), its side effects (diabetes and asthma-like respiratory problems) and Homo Sedensis (too unfit to undergo military training).

It is not just a UK problem.  More worrying is that America, the country we rely on to protect the democratic values we treasure, is suffering from the same problem, indeed only two US states had an obese adult  population under 25% in 2017, which is a shocking statistic – https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/prevalence-maps.html. Consequently the Americans are also lowering recruiting standards.  This New York Times article makes this worrying point:  “On top of having to compete with a robust economy, with an unemployment rate below 4 percent, the Army must pick from what it says is a shrinking pool of eligible recruits.  More than two-thirds of young adults do not qualify for military service because of poor physical fitness or other issues such as drug use, according to the Army.”  https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/21/us/army-recruiting-shortage.html

So, what to do about it?  Given that the human race is unlikely to become slim and super fit, a solution may be forced on our Government and armed forces, indeed it may already be happening.  A short piece in the Sunday Telegraph on 28^th October 2018 reported a prediction by Ben Nimmo of The Atlantic Institute “I think we are going to see more and more troll armies.  The perception has gone out that Russia threw the US election… It’s a lot cheaper than having a [real] army”.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2018/10/27/democracies-face-misinformation-arms-raceled-state-sponsored/

Which is why Prof Paul Theron, a member of NATO’s cybersecurity research group, recently said that the UK needs a 50,000 strong Cyber Army to defend it against Cyber attacks.  https://www.cybersecurity-insiders.com/britain-is-vulnerable-to-cyber-attacks-due-to-the-shortage-of-50k-cyber-security-specialists/   (Also see https://sputniknews.com/politics/201706301055129492-pentagon-on-russian-troll-power/ )

Dare I say that this is an ideal job for Homo Sedensis and predict that recruiting will be much easier?

The British Army’s new Chief of the General Staff (who does not read this blog) would disagree with my proposition.  The following text is taken from an interview for the Daily Telegraph on 23^rd November 2018,

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/11/23/army-chiefmark-carleton-smith-robots-will-never-replace-troops/ with the headline, ‘Robots will never replace troops on the battlefield’:

Nor is Gen Carleton-Smith persuaded that the development of autonomous war-fighting technology, such as drones and robots, will diminish the need for soldiers.“Warfare is fundamentally a contest of human will,” he said. “Robotics are the next horizon in terms of being the new arrow in the quiver. But fundamentally I believe you are never going to remove the visceral human aspect to it, particularly if you believe that warfare is conducted to shape a particular political condition. “The nature of warfare therefore will remain unchanged. But the means by which it is waged will embrace new systems.”The development of new technologies does, though, mean that the Army now faces an era of unprecedented change, one the energetic Gen Carleton-Smith is eager to embrace.“The challenge is to cater for all conventional military responses but also the less conventional areas, such as cyber. That will require different thinking and skills.”

I hope you can now see how I have joined the dots up in my mind.  When Obesity, Homo Sedensis, armed forces recruiting problems and Troll Armies are linked to the terminator-style robot soldiers mentioned in my last blog, is it too far-fetched to predict that at some time in the future we will no longer see human BOG?

The Future?

(Russian Military Army Soldier Troll for sale on Ebay)

Cyber Warfare – An unethical 21st Century Arms Race

I am far too modest to think that the UK MoD’s Chief Scientific Adviser (Simon Cholerton) reads my blog, but…

A few weeks ago I mused about the ethics of Cyber Warfare.  Then a week later the Daily Telegraph carried a report of an interview with Simon Cholerton in which he states that terminator-style robot soldiers and weapon systems that kill without human command are “absolutely unethical” and will not be developed by the UK.  You may question whether this scenario fits into Cyber Warfare.  I argue that it does because in the broadest sense I envisage such weapons receiving their launching orders via cyberspace.

In the report Simon Cholerton recognises that “There is a certain amount of asymmetry around this, and there always is when you face an enemy who doesn’t share you values”.  He would say that, wouldn’t he?  After all we British do like to hold the moral high ground in such matters, but already in my previous blog I was worrying about how the civilised global community can control and police those rogue nations and non-nation groups that have no ethical principles.  A conundrum I have no answer for, other than we must fight in cyber space to defend our values.

The Telegraph’s Editorial seizes on the fact that “there is no doubt that a 21st-century arms race is under way – one in which data, not bullets and nuclear megatons, are the guarantors of supremacy.”  That is of course now obvious, although I had not given this much thought until I read it.  This is history as it is happening.  It is being written about as we speak, thus there is much speculation into this unknown and complex arena, because it is an arena in the violent fighting sense of Roman gladiatorial combat.  For those reasons I agree with the editorial’s assessment because it makes sense.

The article is pictured below:

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Cyber Warfare … Can it / should it be ethical?

This week’s blog was inspired by two recent and seemingly unconnected pieces.  They however provoked thoughts in my mind.

The first was the report in various sources on 24^th October about Tim Cook of Apple saying that people’s personal data is being “weaponised with military efficiency” by tech companies.  Initially my mind boggled, yet it did not take too much imagination to see how this could be exploited by Governments to conduct non-kinetic warfare, either directly or by proxy.  My thoughts were reinforced through my previous research for my recent blog titled ‘Information Warfare – Cyber Warfare by another name’, which noted “The Justice Department said it had received “exceptional cooperation” in its probe from Facebook, Twitter and other “private sector companies” in unmasking Project Lakhta.  Well!  You can see why Tim Cook “warned about governments abusing users’ data and their trust”.  (There are numerous reports on this topic.  Here is one: https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/apple-tim-cook-data-privacy-gdpr-security-facebook-instagram-google-a8599351.html)

Then, on 26^th October, the Daily Telegraph published this article:  https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2018/10/26/uncle-sam-wants-big-tech-side-10bn-deal/ .  The unexpected angle is that whilst the big US technology giants (Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Oracle and IBM) are interested in bidding for the Pentagon’s $10Bn Joint Enterprise Defence Infrastructure (JEDI), many (apparently) of their liberal employees are opposed to what they develop and build being used to wage war, with Google and Microsoft employees writing open letters to this effect.  The Google letter was written as far back as April 2018. It states that Google has a moral and ethical responsibility and therefore requested to the CEO that Google nor its contractors should ever build warfare technology. (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/04/technology/google-letter-ceo-pentagon-project.html )  The Microsoft letter was more recent (October 2018) and states ‘Many Microsoft employees don’t believe that what we build should be used for waging war.’  (https://medium.com/s/story/an-open-letter-to-microsoft-dont-bid-on-the-us-military-s-project-jedi-7279338b7132 )

So what?  Two thoughts.  First, my imagination is having humorous thoughts about how US Generals reacted to this development.  Second, and more seriously, it has started to make me contemplate whether ethical controls can and should be placed on Cyber Warfare.  After all the international community has generally long signed up to the Laws of War (Geneva and Hague Conventions) which forbid certain practices and set other conditions.  Taking non-kinetic cyber warfare to its potential extreme, it could bring great misery to entire populations, for example, if all power is lost, hospitals cannot function (you might recognise the featured image from the 2017 NHS hack) and the population has no heat and light.

Can such elements of Cyber Warfare be banned?  In theory yes, but in practice can anonymous and unattributed cyber attacks be policed effectively?  This will need deeper thinking.  I may follow up in a later post as I learn more.

 

Works referenced:

Scott Shane and Daisuke Wakabayashi ‘The Business of War’: Google Employees Protest Work for the Pentagon (2018),<https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/04/technology/google-letter-ceo-pentagon-project.html> [accessed 06/11/2018].

View this collection on Medium.com

Margi Murphy, Uncle Sam wants big tech on its side with $10bn deal (2018), <https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2018/10/26/uncle-sam-wants-big-tech-side-10bn-deal/> [accessed 06/11/2018].

Andrew Griffin, Apple boss Tim Cook says people’s Data is being ‘Weaponised with military efficiency’ by Tech companies (2018),<https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/apple-tim-cook-data-privacy-gdpr-security-facebook-instagram-google-a8599351.html> [accessed 06/11/2018].

Employees of Microsoft, An Open Letter to Microsoft: Don’t Bid on the US Military’s Project JEDI (2018),<https://medium.com/s/story/an-open-letter-to-microsoft-dont-bid-on-the-us-military-s-project-jedi-7279338b7132> [accessed 06/11/2018].

 

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So … Britain has hacked off Belgium

I have been writing this blog for less than a month, but already there is very little that surprises me.  In my previous blog I claimed to be taking a balanced approach to how I viewed the contemporary Cyber world, so to prove that I am looking at Cyber Warfare with a broad mind, I am not going to brush this one under the carpet, despite the fact I am British.

In 1914 we went to war in defence of ‘plucky little Belgium’.  Fast forward a century or so and we are nearing the end of nearly four years of commemoration for the centenaries of the key battles and campaigns fought between 1914 and 1918. Indeed in eleven days time we will commemorate the centenary of the Armistice.  Well, how times change! It seems that just before 2014 Britain was spying on Belgium. Am I the only one who smells the hypocrisy!  Like some of the other events I have commented on, although I have only just learnt about this activity, it is in fact old news.

What drew it to my attention was this news article from last week:  https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/oct/25/uk-refusal-cooperate-belgian-hacking-inquiry-condemned-gchq-belgacom (Whilst I would not describe myself as a regular guardian reader, much to the chagrin of my fellow students, they have run a rather good thread on Cyber related stories, hence they have been regularly featured in my blog)

Being a sceptic and believing that there is ‘no smoke without fire’, the basis of the accusation has to be true.  It seems that yet again the ghost of the Edward Snowden leaks come to haunt the British government, for otherwise we, the public, might never have known about this UK Cyber activity.

The key question is ‘Why was Britain doing this’?  I would like to think it was for good reasons.  Although the lines between good and bad are markedly blurred, it could be that Britain was worried about Belgium spying on them (in this day and age it’s so hard to trust one’s allies) and so in true American-style fashion established a backdoor into the Belgian network to make sure Belgium didn’t have one in the British network (the irony of this situation is not lost on me). Indeed it might simply be we wished to spy on the Belgium government. However, neither of these reasons truly seem plausible if you give them any thought.

No, if I had been 22 a decade ago I would not have been able to think of a reason why the UK would want to spy on Belgium.  Even now when I first read the article I was thinking to myself that ‘surely the Government has more urgent and pressing concerns?’. However, the rise of Isis over the past half-decade or so begins to give a clue as to why the UK hacked Belgium; radical Islam is arguably still on the rise in certain areas of Europe, either through terrorists taking advantage of the massive influx of refugees fleeing the Middle East (a mess of the West’s own making), or grown in Europe through radicalisation. People would do well to remember that the several of the perpetrators of the November 2015 Paris attacks were French or Belgian citizens. Furthermore Brahim and Salah Abdeslam were born and raised in Belgium: https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/europe/what-led-a-young-muslim-belgian-to-become-an-isis-terrorist-1.5788277 & https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34832512)

Thus I would postulate that GCHQ’s purpose was to eavesdrop on the communications of the various Islamic fundamentalist terrorist groups and not spy on Belgium. My argument is supported by part of the Guardian’s article:  There was a particular focus on the Belgian company’s subsidiary unit, Belgacom International Carrier Services, which handles phone and data traffic in Africa and the Middle East. It was reported that the British espionage operation was also seeking to target communications made between roaming smartphones.

Does this activity constitute Cyber Warfare?  Looking back at my earlier model and definition, my answer is ‘Yes’.

 

Definitions:

A backdoor in a computer system or  software in this situation refers to a secret portal that hackers and (in this situation) intelligence agencies use to gain illicit access.

For more info, Wired provides an in depth description of the phrase: https://www.wired.com/2014/12/hacker-lexicon-backdoor/

 

Works referenced:

Daniel Boffey, UK refusal to cooperate with Belgian hacking inquiry condemned (2018), <https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/oct/25/uk-refusal-cooperate-belgian-hacking-inquiry-condemned-gchq-belgacom> [Accessed 01/11/2018]

 

Haaretz, Tracing the Roots of European Terror: What Led a Young Belgian to Become an ISIS Terrorist (2018), <https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/europe/what-led-a-young-muslim-belgian-to-become-an-isis-terrorist-1.5788277> [Accessed 01/11/2018].

BBC, Paris attacks: Who were the attackers? (2016), <https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34832512> [Accessed 01/11/2018].

Kim Zetter, Hacker Lexicon: What is a Backdoor? (2014) <https://www.wired.com/2014/12/hacker-lexicon-backdoor/> [Accessed 01/11/2018].

On Cyber Warfare – Peeking into the future (from Beijing’s perspective?)

When approaching these blogs I am trying to be balanced in how I view the contemporary Cyber world.  However, it is inevitable that I will have some bias and naturally I see it from a British viewpoint. Yet, aided by a cynical attitude, I am careful not to assume that the apparent ‘good guys’ are good and the ‘bad guys’ are bad.  It is rare for things to be so clear cut these days and, given the rise of ‘fake news’, due diligence is required when researching articles for these blogs.

With that caveat in mind, the following case is a fascinating example of how difficult it is to define whether an activity is merely Strategic Investment, Cyber Theft or Cyber Warfare, and also trying to prove whether a state has a hand in it.  (This post grew the more I researched China’s involvement in Cyber ‘activities’.)

The case hit the news at the beginning of October 2018, but in fact it refers to events which date back to 2015 that have apparently been under investigation for the past three years.  The allegation is that sub-contractors in China inserted tiny microchips onto motherboards for servers being assembled by a company in the USA.  Some of these servers were used in a number of areas within the US Department of Defense.

This was the Bloomberg article that scooped the news in October 2018:  https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-10-04/the-big-hack-how-china-used-a-tiny-chip-to-infiltrate-america-s-top-companies

The Guardian’s analysis of the ‘sensational’ Bloomberg article (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/oct/13/tech-giants-us-chinese-spy-chips-bloomberg-supermicro-amazon-apple ) is that there is truth in the allegations, despite denials.

Is this Cyber Warfare?  In my opinion it most certainly is, because if true, then the inescapable conclusion is that this was state sponsored.

Although the Bloomberg article describes the technical capabilities of the chips, what was/is their purpose?  Here I can only speculate.  Are the chips passive, but able to gather intelligence (intellectual, commercial or even military)?  Or are they active, and thus could they be sent commands at the right time to disable networks and systems?  Again I can also only speculate that this is part of a broad and strategic long campaign of preparation coordinated by the President Xi Jinping’s Government in Beijing.

The Guardian’s comment concludes with a “Stay tuned”; I will.

This article from a year ago (October 2017) however gives a balanced counter-point, not least because it shows that China was a victim of Cyber Warfare using ransomware developed by the US National Security Agency. ( https://www.fairobserver.com/region/asia_pacific/china-cyberwarfare-cybersecurity-asia-pacific-news-analysis-04253/ )

Staying on the subject of the Chinese Government’s strategic intentions, a member of the public like me would be forgiven for being confused about whether China poses a threat or not.  At the heart of this confusion is the potential Cyber threat and trying to interpret China’s activities with that in mind.

You may recall the doubt about the UK Government allowing Chinese funding to finance the Hinkley Point power station project and the security misgivings it caused, and also similar concerns about the Chinese telecoms giant Huawei’s smartphones and broadband infrastructure.  See these two articles:

• From August 2016 about Chinese investment in Hinkley Point:  https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/beta.scmagazineuk.com/amp/concern-chinese-involvement-hinkley-point-misdirected-say-experts/article/1476831

• From July 2018 about Huawei:  https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/07/19/huawei-security-risks-threaten-critical-uk-broadband-phone-networks/amp/

What do I deduce from these articles?  No clear answer either way, which therefore leaves me feeling doubtful about China’s activities, i.e. I am concerned that the UK is vulnerable. Indeed this concern is supported by China’s activities outside cyberspace with China’s action’s in the South China Sea being a prime example (an area Jinping recently ordered to be prepared for war: http://uk.businessinsider.com/chinas-president-orders-military-to-prepare-for-south-china-sea-war-2018-10?r=US&IR=T) undoubtedly influenced by Jinping’s ambitious Belt and Roads initiative.

Regardless of my concerns, it may be too late.  Are the digital equivalent of Sleeper Agents (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleeper_agent ) already in place?  Time will tell, I fear.

Works referenced:

Ryan Pickrell, China’s commander-in-chief has ordered the military command overseeing the South China Sea to prepare for war (2018) <http://uk.businessinsider.com/chinas-president-orders-military-to-prepare-for-south-china-sea-war-2018-10?r=US&IR=T> [accessed 30 October 2018].

Jordan Roberson and Michael Riley, The Big Hack: How China Used a Tiny Chip to Infiltrate U.S. Companies (2018) <https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-10-04/the-big-hack-how-china-used-a-tiny-chip-to-infiltrate-america-s-top-companies> [accessed 30 October 2018].

John Naughton, The tech giants, the US and the Chinese spy chips that never were… or were they? (2018)  <https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/oct/13/tech-giants-us-chinese-spy-chips-bloomberg-supermicro-amazon-apple>  [accessed 30 October 2018].

Elizabeth Van Wie Davis, China’s Cyberwarfare Finds New Targets (2017)<https://www.fairobserver.com/region/asia_pacific/china-cyberwarfare-cybersecurity-asia-pacific-news-analysis-04253/> [accessed 30 October 2018].

Tom Reeve, Concern about Chinese involvement at Hinkley Point is misdirected, say experts (2016) <https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/beta.scmagazineuk.com/amp/concern-chinese-involvement-hinkley-point-misdirected-say-experts/article/1476831> [accessed 30 October 2018].

Christopher Hope, China’s Huawei poses security risks to UK broadband and phone networks, British spies warn (2018),<https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/07/19/huawei-security-risks-threaten-critical-uk-broadband-phone-networks/amp/> [accessed 30 October 2018].

Wikipedia, Sleeper Agent (2018) <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleeper_agent> [accessed 30 October 2018].

USCNPM, China, the United States, and Cyber-Warfare (2013)<https://www.uscnpm.org/blog/2013/03/06/china-the-united-states-and-cyber-warfare/&gt; [accessed 30 October 2018]

Here are some articles and videos on China which you might find interesting if you wish to learn more about current affairs relating to the South China Sea & The Roads and belts initiative:

https://www.theguardian.com/cities/ng-interactive/2018/jul/30/what-china-belt-road-initiative-silk-road-explainer

https://foreignpolicy.com/2011/08/15/the-south-china-sea-is-the-future-of-conflict/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luTPMHC7zHY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvXROXiIpvQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OubM8bD9kck

Hybrid (Cyber) Warfare by Meddling Russians

Another day, another blog. There is no let up on reports relating to Cyber Warfare being published on the web, highlighting how common its use has become these days.  Today the BBC posted this interesting (I am aware that I am using the word ‘interesting’ quite often in my blogs, however there is no avoiding it) and comprehensive report: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-us-canada-45919170/midterms-is-russia-still-meddling-in-us-elections

I would highly recommend watching this report, not only because of its relevance to cyber warfare, but also because the results of the midterm elections in America will have an indirect impact on the UK and to a certain extent global politics.  I have extracted two quotes which are of particular interest:

• By Gordon Corera, the BBC’s Security Correspondent:  The Russians are employing very clever techniques, techniques of hybrid warfare, below the threshold of war, employing a wide range of cyber hacking, cyber espionage, social media.  His quote nicely fits into my model and definition of Cyber Warfare.
• By Paul Wood, the BBC’s World Affairs Correspondent:  Now of course there is a very convincing alternative explanation for all of this, which is that the Russian intelligence services decided to carry out ’provokatsya’, a fabricated piece of information designed to dismay and confuse the enemy ... I have highlighted it because it is relevant to my broad interest in state organised or sponsored cyber warfare.

Carera makes a notable comment on the U.S government machine not being organised to cope with this type of hybrid warfare because it cuts across the boundaries of all of the various U.S security agencies.

So far the reporting all seems to be about attacks by the ‘East’ on the ‘West’.  Yet I am certain there must be credible reports about attacks going the other way. Will I find any of these reports? Only time will tell.

 

Reports referenced:

BBC News, Midterms: Is Russia still meddling in US elections? <https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-us-canada-45919170/midterms-is-russia-still-meddling-in-us-elections&gt; [accessed 22/10/2018].

 

 

Information Warfare – Cyber Warfare by another name

Less than 24 hours after my last blog, in which I presented my simple model trying to illustrate how Cyber Warfare fits into Warfare and my definition of it, a story broke in America which I think confirms some of my ideas.

A number of sources report that the US Justice Department had charged a Russian woman, Elena Khusyaynova, for conspiring to interfere with the 2018 United States elections.  They all report pretty much the same thing, so I include only one reference, which is the CNBC report (https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/19/woman-linked-to-russian-troll-farm-charged-with-interference-in-2018-midterms.html).  Here are the key points extracted from it:

• Khusyaynova is charged with trying to interfere and “sow discord” in the American political system, including in the 2018 midterm elections as part of a conspiracy that exploited thousands of social media accounts and emails that claimed to be owned by U.S. residents
• She is accused of participating in a conspiracy engaged in “information warfare against the United States” that aimed to “create and amplify divisive social media and political content.”
• The case against Khusyaynova is the first to involve alleged interference in next month’s Congressional elections.
• Prosecutors claim Khusyaynova is the chief accountant for a Russian entity dubbed Project Lakhta, and managed the group’s financing.
• That group is backed by a Russian oligarch Yevgeniy Viktorovich Prigozhin, who has been called “Putin’s chef”.
• Prosecutors noted that the conspirators’ activities “did not exclusively adopt one ideological view; they wrote on topics from varied and sometimes opposing perspectives.”  “Members of the conspiracy were directed, among other things, to create ‘political intensity through supporting radical groups” and to ‘aggravate the conflict between minorities and the rest of the population’.  The effort targeted both Democrats and Republicans.
• The Justice Department said it had received “exceptional cooperation” in its probe from Facebook, Twitter and other “private sector companies.”

 

This is all very interesting and fascinating.  My comments are:

1. The reference to ‘information warfare’ and the description of Project Lakhta’s purpose fits into my model and definition of Cyber Warfare.
2. Surely President Putin has to be connected to this through Prigozhin?  Although he and his regime are at an arm’s length, I see this activity at least being state sponsored cyber warfare.
3. There is much to read between the lines in the references to exceptional cooperation from Facebook, Twitter and other private sector companies (and this itself begs many questions, which I may consider another day).  We can only speculate about how the US Government identified this operation, but the Americans are clearly confident enough to go public and prosecute.  Presumably they themselves have been in cyberspace tracking the Project Lakhta activity.
4. This is more than just a criminal prosecution.  This is a state to state message sending exercise.  This article (https://www.wired.com/story/russia-indictment-twitter-facebook-play-both-sides/) makes the point that the US government is saying ‘We know what you were doing, here’s how much we know’ as part of an increasingly aggressive strategy of naming and shaming foreign government operatives, making it clear that Russia cannot act with impunity.

Furthermore, knowledge of Project Lakhta seems to be old news.  A quick google pulled up this article published eight months ago (https://www.cyberscoop.com/how-russias-2016-election-information-warfare-worked/).  The article states more of the same, Russian operatives ‘…stealing the identities of U.S. citizens, renting servers based in the U.S. and using a VPN all while posting targeted propaganda on social media to disrupt American politics’ to again interfere with U.S. politics.

I did not expect or plan to post articles on subsequent days, but yesterday’s news was too interesting and significant to leave it to the end of next week.  It shows that the Cyber world is dynamic and fast moving.

 

Works referenced:

Mangan, Dan, ”Information warfare:’ Feds charge Russian woman with interference in US political system, midterm elections’, CNBC, 19 October 2018. <https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/19/woman-linked-to-russian-troll-farm-charged-with-interference-in-2018-midterms.html> [accessed 21/10/2018]

O’Neill, Patrick Howell, ‘Indictments reveal how Russia’s 2016 election information warfare worked’, cyberscoop, 16 February 2018. <https://www.cyberscoop.com/how-russias-2016-election-information-warfare-worked/> [accessed 21/10/2018].

Graff, Garrett M., RUSSIAN TROLLS ARE STILL PLAYING BOTH SIDES—EVEN WITH THE MUELLER PROBE, Wired, 19 October 2018. <https://www.wired.com/story/russia-indictment-twitter-facebook-play-both-sides/> [accessed 21/10/2018]

On Cyber Warfare – developing a model to understand it.

In my first blog earlier this week, I described my interest in state organised or sponsored Cyber Warfare as well as also expressing caution in trying to define the boundaries around what it constitutes.  Since publishing that blog I have been attempting to clear my own mind about it and how it relates to older forms of warfare.

As a consequence of this train of thought I sketched out a simple model.  This model is a work in progress and since making it I am unsure if it accurately shows how Cyber Warfare fits in, but I believe it does begin to show that placing aspects of it in clearly defined boundaries is not straightforward.

In particular, is the act of deliberately attacking computer systems Non-Kinetic or Kinetic?  On the surface you can very logically say it is non-kinetic. Attacking a computer system does not generate the obvious violent effects of an air bombing campaign, such as the US ‘Shock and Awe’ campaign which destroyed Iraq’s power networks. Yet, once you dig a little deeper into cyber warfare the previously straightforward answer becomes far more complex. The physical effects of a cyber attack and bombing campaign can be the same, i.e. a cyber attack can in theory bring power stations to a halt and stop a nation’s power supply.  Is this result not kinetic?  I argue it is, so my conclusion is that Cyber Warfare straddles both Non-Kinetic and Kinetic warfare.

However, upon drawing this conclusion and re-reading my previous blog, I quickly realised that the model did not fit in with the definition of cyber warfare put forward by Richard A. Clarke and Robert K. Knake in their book Cyber War: The Next Threat to National Security and What to Do About It. It was this definition that I presented in my first blog.  The issue with this definition is that it is too narrow and technical, limiting its focus to computers and systems, whereas my model attempts to show that deliberate cyber warfare can also be used to attack the human mind, albeit in an unconventional manner.  As a result I personally would define Cyber Warfare as:  Non-Kinetic and Kinetic Warfare in Cyber space.  Perhaps I have done the opposite of Clarke and Knake’s narrow definition, and made this definition too broad?  I hope to find out in my future studies.

Those are my early thoughts.  To support my model and definition I will try to give examples in future blogs. Indeed it will be interesting to see how the model evolves during the course of my studies.

Works referenced:

Clarke, R. A. and Knake, R. A., Cyberwar, (New York: Ecco Press., 2010).