clydeiii/cybersecurity · Datasets at Hugging Face

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The data trail often goes cold when it crosses borders because there is little
legal framework for such investigations. And many countries, along with the
United Nations and other international bodies, are still weighing whether a
cyber attack is an act of war.
"If a state brings down the Internet intentionally, another state could very well
consider that a hostile act," said Jonathan Zittrain, co-founder of Harvard's
Berkman Center for Internet Society, and a principal investigator for the
OpenNet Initiative.
There are also strategic reasons not to disrupt networks in order to monitor the
enemy's conversations or to spread misinformation.
"That's an amazing intelligence opportunity," he said.
Using the Internet to control information can be more important than
disrupting the networks when it comes to military strategy, Rohozinski said. In
Georgia, for example, the lack of access to both Georgian and Russian
sources of information kept citizens in the dark while the fighting continued.
"Sometimes the objective is not to knock out the infrastructure but to
undermine the will of the people you're fighting against," he said. "It's about
the nuts and bolts, but it's also about how perceptions can be shaped
through what's available and what's not."
NEWSWEEK
1 September 2008
By Trevis Wentworth
ve Got Malice
Russian nationalists waged a cyber war against Georgia. Fighting back is
virtually impossible.
On July 20, weeks before Russia stunned Georgia with a rapid invasion, the
cyber attack was already under way. While Moscow baited Georgia with
troop movements on the borders of the breakaway provinces of Abkhazia
and South Ossetia, the "zombie" computers were already on the attack.
Russian viruses had seized hundreds of thousands of computers around the
world, directing them to barrage Georgian Web sites, including the pages of
the president, the parliament, the foreign ministry, news agencies and banks,
which shut down their servers at the first sign of attack to pre-empt identity
theft. At one point the parliament's Web site was replaced by images
comparing Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili to Adolf Hitler. This was not
the first Russian cyber assault
that came against Estonia, in April of 2007
it was the first time an Internet attack paralleled one on land.
The labyrinthine ways of the Web and the complicated interfaces between
the Russian government's clandestine services and organized crime make it
impossible, at this point, to say with certainty who was responsible, or how far
up the chain of command it went. The Russian military certainly had the
means to attack Georgia's Internet infrastructure, says Jonathan Zittrain,
cofounder of Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet and Society. Moreover,
the attacks were too successful to have materialized independent of one
another. Bill Woodcock, the research director at Packet Clearing House, a
California-based nonprofit group that tracks Internet security trends, says the
attacks bear the markings of a "trained and centrally coordinated cadre of
professionals."
But who? Jart Armin, who has tracked Russian cybercrime, points to the
possibility that a role was played by the notorious Russian Business Network, a
cybermafia that specializes in identity theft, child pornography, extortion and
other dark and lucrative Internet crimes. The RBN's political agenda is vague
or nonexistent, but it often contracts out its services, and Armin says there is
increasing evidence that it is connected to, or at least tolerated by, the
Kremlin.
Indeed the timing is such that it's hard to discount some sort of Kremlin
coordination, even if it's impossible to prove, and Woodcock argues that such
cyber assaults have become a tool of Russian political leadership. As the
attacks' political intentions became more specific, he notes, the operations
have grown more complex. In addition to targeting Georgian government
and media Web sites, Russian hackers brought down the Russian newspaper
Skandaly.ru, apparently for expressing some pro-Georgian sentiment. "This
was the first time that they ever attacked an internal and an external target
as part of the same attack," he says.
Fighting back is tough. When Russian hackers made a name for themselves
last year by bringing down the Web site of the Estonian parliament along with
the sites of banks, ministries and newspapers, Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas
Paet immediately accused the Kremlin of backing the attacks. But he was
unable to produce evidence supporting his claims. Putin eventually named a
suspect, or scapegoat, within his government. As Russian hackers waged a
similar assault on Georgian sites over the past few weeks, Estonia
one of
Europe's most wired countries
offered its better-defended servers to host
many Georgian government Web sites. Lithuania and Poland have stepped
up as well, prompting some excited bloggers to suggest that this is a digital
Sarajevo, akin to the events of August 1914, the start of the first Internet world
war. Certainly that's exaggerated, but the mutual defense going on in
cyberspace shows that these nations take the Russian threat to their online
infrastructure seriously.
Still, the nature of the Internet is such that it is almost impossible to respond
quickly enough. The government doesn't maintain its own botnets
large
networks of zombified computers standing ready to attack
but can rent one
from a crime network, like the Russian Business Network. Then, through statecontrolled media, the government can inspire waves of nationalists to amplify
the destructive force. "Everybody with a laptop has the responsibility to attack
the enemy
and you find out who the enemy is by looking at what the
government is saying," Woodcock says.
While no one can say who wrote the malware that was used to cause
Georgian servers to crash, it certainly proliferated on Russian Web sites in a
user-friendly form. Gary Warner, a cybercrime expert at the University of
Alabama at Birmingham, says he found "copies of the attack script" posted in
the reader comments section at the bottom of virtually every story in the
Russian media that covered the Georgian conflict, complete with instructions
on how the script could be used to attack a specific list of Web sites. The
efficiency is enough to make Russia's tanks and planes and ships, however
deadly, appear downright anachronistic.

The data trail often goes cold when it crosses borders because there is little

legal framework for such investigations. And many countries, along with the

United Nations and other international bodies, are still weighing whether a

cyber attack is an act of war.

"If a state brings down the Internet intentionally, another state could very well

consider that a hostile act," said Jonathan Zittrain, co-founder of Harvard's

Berkman Center for Internet Society, and a principal investigator for the

OpenNet Initiative.

There are also strategic reasons not to disrupt networks in order to monitor the

enemy's conversations or to spread misinformation.

"That's an amazing intelligence opportunity," he said.

Using the Internet to control information can be more important than

disrupting the networks when it comes to military strategy, Rohozinski said. In

Georgia, for example, the lack of access to both Georgian and Russian

sources of information kept citizens in the dark while the fighting continued.

"Sometimes the objective is not to knock out the infrastructure but to

undermine the will of the people you're fighting against," he said. "It's about

the nuts and bolts, but it's also about how perceptions can be shaped

through what's available and what's not."

NEWSWEEK

1 September 2008

By Trevis Wentworth

ve Got Malice

Russian nationalists waged a cyber war against Georgia. Fighting back is

virtually impossible.

On July 20, weeks before Russia stunned Georgia with a rapid invasion, the

cyber attack was already under way. While Moscow baited Georgia with

troop movements on the borders of the breakaway provinces of Abkhazia

and South Ossetia, the "zombie" computers were already on the attack.

Russian viruses had seized hundreds of thousands of computers around the

world, directing them to barrage Georgian Web sites, including the pages of

the president, the parliament, the foreign ministry, news agencies and banks,

which shut down their servers at the first sign of attack to pre-empt identity

theft. At one point the parliament's Web site was replaced by images

comparing Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili to Adolf Hitler. This was not

the first Russian cyber assault

that came against Estonia, in April of 2007

it was the first time an Internet attack paralleled one on land.

The labyrinthine ways of the Web and the complicated interfaces between

the Russian government's clandestine services and organized crime make it

impossible, at this point, to say with certainty who was responsible, or how far

up the chain of command it went. The Russian military certainly had the

means to attack Georgia's Internet infrastructure, says Jonathan Zittrain,

cofounder of Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet and Society. Moreover,

the attacks were too successful to have materialized independent of one

another. Bill Woodcock, the research director at Packet Clearing House, a

California-based nonprofit group that tracks Internet security trends, says the

attacks bear the markings of a "trained and centrally coordinated cadre of

professionals."

But who? Jart Armin, who has tracked Russian cybercrime, points to the

possibility that a role was played by the notorious Russian Business Network, a

cybermafia that specializes in identity theft, child pornography, extortion and

other dark and lucrative Internet crimes. The RBN's political agenda is vague

or nonexistent, but it often contracts out its services, and Armin says there is

increasing evidence that it is connected to, or at least tolerated by, the

Kremlin.

Indeed the timing is such that it's hard to discount some sort of Kremlin

coordination, even if it's impossible to prove, and Woodcock argues that such

cyber assaults have become a tool of Russian political leadership. As the

attacks' political intentions became more specific, he notes, the operations

have grown more complex. In addition to targeting Georgian government

and media Web sites, Russian hackers brought down the Russian newspaper

Skandaly.ru, apparently for expressing some pro-Georgian sentiment. "This

was the first time that they ever attacked an internal and an external target

as part of the same attack," he says.

Fighting back is tough. When Russian hackers made a name for themselves

last year by bringing down the Web site of the Estonian parliament along with

the sites of banks, ministries and newspapers, Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas

Paet immediately accused the Kremlin of backing the attacks. But he was

unable to produce evidence supporting his claims. Putin eventually named a

suspect, or scapegoat, within his government. As Russian hackers waged a

similar assault on Georgian sites over the past few weeks, Estonia

one of

Europe's most wired countries

offered its better-defended servers to host

many Georgian government Web sites. Lithuania and Poland have stepped

up as well, prompting some excited bloggers to suggest that this is a digital

Sarajevo, akin to the events of August 1914, the start of the first Internet world

war. Certainly that's exaggerated, but the mutual defense going on in

cyberspace shows that these nations take the Russian threat to their online

infrastructure seriously.

Still, the nature of the Internet is such that it is almost impossible to respond

quickly enough. The government doesn't maintain its own botnets

large

networks of zombified computers standing ready to attack

but can rent one

from a crime network, like the Russian Business Network. Then, through statecontrolled media, the government can inspire waves of nationalists to amplify

the destructive force. "Everybody with a laptop has the responsibility to attack

the enemy

and you find out who the enemy is by looking at what the

government is saying," Woodcock says.

While no one can say who wrote the malware that was used to cause

Georgian servers to crash, it certainly proliferated on Russian Web sites in a

user-friendly form. Gary Warner, a cybercrime expert at the University of

Alabama at Birmingham, says he found "copies of the attack script" posted in

the reader comments section at the bottom of virtually every story in the

Russian media that covered the Georgian conflict, complete with instructions

on how the script could be used to attack a specific list of Web sites. The

efficiency is enough to make Russia's tanks and planes and ships, however

deadly, appear downright anachronistic.