Threats in cyberspace
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Key words:
Cyberspace, Cybercrime, Cyberespionage, Cyberwar, Cyberterrorism.
Summary:
The widespread of the Internet led to the situation where more and more devices
and people depend on cyberspace. Nevertheless, the new virtual world bring both new
chances and concurrently new threats, which influence the world of international
relations.
The following article aims to identify the real threats in cyberspace, which are the
cybercrime and cyberespionage and simultaneously demystified the phenomenon of
cybewar and cyberterrorism. The article enumerates the most serious spies and crimes
activities in cyberspace and tries to estimate the possible losses and the motives behind
actions. In reference to cybeterrorism this work explains hysteria, which broke out after
the 9/11 and clarifies why the act of cyberterrorism has never happened and probably it
will not in the future. The similar scenario is with the cyberwar, where the article
presents the Carl von Clausewitz definition of war and tries to apply the most serious
cyberattack to it without any positive effect. There is also an attempt to predict the
development of trends in future.
The rising role of cyberspace1
The beginning of 90s was a signal of coming of a new era that significantly
changed different aspects on the international area. This turbulent time was dominated
by such events like the Soviet Union collapse, West and East Germany unification and
the first Gulf War. There was additional one important landmark, whose consequences
were long term and was commonly called the information revolution. The main cause of
it laid in the common spread of the Internet2 that allowed to send information in
milliseconds and communicate each other from every place in the world. The number of
Internet users has been constantly rising since 1995, when amounted to 16 million. In
2012 near 3 billion people were connected to global network [1].
This phenomenon significantly has influenced literally every aspect of modern society
life and has impacted the way of state functioning and has contributed to rise of
information society. The unique characteristics of cyberspace like omnipresence, which
allowed the users to get access to it from literally every place in the world and the
relatively low cost of participation have encouraged entities such as governments,
private entrepreneurs and last but not least individual users to use cyberspace to both
work and relax. The novel tools and services helpful in functioning of the states and
individuals were invented like the Internet websites, electronic mails and many others
[2,p. 125-126]. These new discoveries galvanized private companies into action and
they decided to move their services to cyberspace, the banks started opening banking
online system and the shops offered opportunities to buy things thorough the Internet,
even the state administration was following this way and offered electronic services like
the voting through the Internet. In addition, the increasing number of elements of state
critical infrastructure have become more and more dependent on the cyberspace.
Simultaneously, the birth of new chances and rise of potential benefits led to the
emerge of new threats to international security. The virtual world was quickly exploited by
groups of criminals, spies, hackers and ultimately the military of the states, who started to
seek ways to inflict damages through usage of cyberspace. The architecture of this
environment has promoted the offensive actions. At the time this domain was projected the
security did not lie in the center of priorities because no one in that time thought about the
global range of created network. The cyber attacks could be perceived as “weapon of the
poor men” due to the little costs and only two tools necessary to carry out it the computer
and Internet access. They could be conducted from every place in the world within seconds
[4, p.60]. The next feature especially tempting for every perpetrator is complete anonymous
that stem from the architecture of virtual domain [5, p. 241]. In addition, cyberspace is
immaterial environment and all territorial obstacles (mountain, forest, seas and rivers)
could not be used to improve defense. The favorable geopolitical location of countries like
Great Britain and the United States surrounded by oceans, which in real world gives an
advantage for defending side, in cyberspace did not play any role. Both countries are in
the same degree vulnerable to attacks like the others, located, for example, on the
continental Europe (6, p.440). These factors cause that countries like North Korea or
Syria, that could not compete with the United States and other advanced countries on
the field of conventional armed force buildup focus on carrying out hostile activities in
cyberspace. The virtual world promotes asymmetry so it is a main reason of growing
activity of these rogue states in this domain.
However, the cyberthreats are omnipresent in contemporary world but they differ
in the character and the degree of danger for functioning the state and society. There are
four popular kinds of threats mostly mentioned in media and experts analysis. Among
them are cyberwar, cyberyterrorism, cyberespionage and cybercrime. Nevertheless the
real degree of danger linked with them is different from widespread belief.
The “hype” threats
The most widespread and the loudly presented threats in media are the cyberwar
and cyberterrorism. The most of the research articles also focus on these threats. They
constitute the example of hype and despite the common belief they do not stand as the
main danger in cyberspace now.
Cyberwar
The popularization of the Internet and the related with it increasing significance
of cyberspace cause that the threat of cyberwar was more and more popular among
experts and journalists. Many articles announcing the ongoing cyberwar between China,
Russia and the United States appeared. However, the problem existed with the
definition of this phenomenon but if we consider the classical concept of war of
Prussian strategist Carl von Clausewitz the cyberwar never happened in the past, is not
occurring in the present, and it is rather small chance that can appear in future (7, p. 78).
Clausewtiz criteria consisted of three main elements: all the acts of war must be violent,
the second one based on the assumption that act of war is always instrumental one: the
usage of physical violence or the threat of doing it is exploited to compel enemy will.
Ultimately, it is necessary to qualify attack as the act of war if have to be a political
motivation or goal beyond it what is intrinsically linked with the attribution of the act of
war to someone [8, p. 15- 32].
There are some incidents, which are commonly perceived as the acts of cyberwar
but no one of them fulfill the three main elements of Clausewitz criteria. The first one
was the explosion on Siberia of the constructed pipeline in 1982. It could be perceived
as the most violent act of cyberattack but the problem appears whether it really
happened. According to Thomas Reed a former member of U.S. National Security
Council the CIA inserted a malicious code to the controlling software of the constructed
pipeline. However, the contradicted information was delivered by Vasily Pchelintsev,
the head of regional department of KGB. He denied that such an event happened and
clarified that Reed referred to harmless explosion that had happened in other time. What
is more, there are no indications of any media report on this topic, despite the fact that
most of the similar events were broadly transmitted. Moreover, taking into
consideration the technology of the 80s carrying out such complex operations seems
implausible. Today, it will be difficult to realize this kind of operation [7, p. 78 – 79].
The second most common accident mentioned as the example of cyberwar are the
attacks occurred in Estonia 2007. As the consequence of removal of Statue
commemorating Soviet soldiers from the Tallin Center to the City suburbs the Denial
Distributed of Service (DDoS) attacks took place and the websites of governmental
institutions and banks were blocked. However, this action was rather similar to non
violent skirmishes than the act of war. Russia was accused of planning this operation,
however there were no proofs of it. The most controversial issue and closely associated
with the concept of war was the Stuxnet worm destroying the Uranium enrichment
centrifuges. It was the first time in history, when cyberattack had consequences in
destruction of psychical world materials. But it was rather an act of sabotage than the
act of war and did not qualify under all three Clausewitz criteria [7, p.78). Obviously
the cyberspace has a significant meaning for the military and the operations, which are
conducted to support and multiple the effect of conventional strike. It happened during
the war in Georgia in 2008 and in Syria in 2007, when Israel attacked the nuclear
reactor. However, the separated cyberwar so loudly announced in media has never
happened but the probability that it could appear in future is plausible.
Cyberterrorism
The most serious challenge linked with the research on the cyberterrorism is the
definition. The commonly recognized one was introduced by the Federal Bureau of
Investigation (FBI). According to this organization: “cyberterrorism is the
deliberated, politically motivated act of violence aimed at information, ICT systems or
database, which has no military character and are conducted by the supranational or
national terrorists groups [9]. The threat of cyberterrorism perfectly fitted in post 9/11
hysteria. Especially, the American media contributed to spread of information about the
possibilities of using cyberspace by terrorists linked with Al-Qaeda. The Washington
Post informed about the feasibility of taking control over dams and power plants and in
consequence the ecological catastrophe paralyzing the life of American society [10,
p.4]. The finding of laptop in Afghanistan belonging to the member of Al-Qaeda with
the specialized programs, similar to these using in American control rooms and the
schemes of the power plants spurred additional fear that the United States could be
attacked from the virtual domain [11]. The widespread panic on the threat of
cyberterrorism erupted when, again “The Washington Post” informed about the FBI
investigation carried out in Silicon Valley about the deliberate damaging computer
equipment produced there. The most of the devises responsible for operating national
critical infrastructure was manufactured in that place. In addition, the information about
the growing interest of Osama Ben Laden organization in exploiting ICT to inflict
damages were worrisome. The members of Al-Qaeda demonstrated the increasing
activity on the hacking Internet forums seeking for the opportunities of using the
malware program[11]. But the threat of coming cyber terrorism was not limited to
media. Even the members of George W. Bush administration started to fear about this
scenario. Tom Ridge the first United States Secretary of Homeland Security in 2003
warned that terrorist might use only one computer connected to network and cause a
chaos on the world. According to him terrorists sitting in front of one computer
connected to network could wreak a havoc on the world. In his opinion terrorist did not
need bombs or explosives devices in order to paralyze the sectors of economy or to turn
off the electrical networks [12].
The American society was really scared of this new kind of threats and expressed
it in the opinion poll conducted by one of the social organization. Cyberterrorism was
classified alongside with the chemical and biological terrorism as threat for national
security[13].
Despite that 30 000 or even more articles were written on this topic of no single
act of cyberterrorism happened [14]. There are two main reasons why terrorists did not
use cyberspace to carry out attacks:
Firstly they main aim of every terrorist activity is to attract the media attention and
the cyberattack could not guarantee achieving it. Even the successful cyberattack
that effectively will cut off the water or electric deliveries may be easy explained
as the mechanical failure or technical problems with software, what many times
happened in the past. The consequences of it are that the terrorists could not
confirm that they perpetrated the attack [10, p. 3].
The second problem appeared with the complex of the action against the elements of
critical infrastructure. The successfully striking against the ICT systems of e.g.
nuclear power plants is very difficult and their systems are well protected from
the electronic penetration. The American electrician infrastructure consisted of
3000 energy distributors, which used different technical solutions. The
presumable victorious operation required simultaneous attacks from multiple
sides that could not be conducted without the significant financial assets and
qualified personnel. Also the attempt to take control over the control on the
airport is not possible because there is always a man alongside the computer who
is responsible for safety landing of planes [ 10, p, 3].
In future there is still low probability of cyberterrorism act appearing. According
to the American Director of Intelligence James Clapper the risk of using the cyberspace
by the terrorists organizations to conduct strike is minimal due to the lack of adequate
technical skills [15, p. 1]. However, the possibility of existence of this threat in future
could not be excluded. Currently, it is an emerging threat than the present one.
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The real threats
Demystification of the concept of cyberwar and cyberterrorism does not mean
that cyberspace is safer. It is rather different, the existed threats are not so interesting for
media but they does not mean that are not dangerous. The most common hostile activity
in virtual domain is about the cyberespionage and cybercrime.
Cyberespionage
The wide spreading of the Internet at the beginning of 90s led to the situation that
currently 98 % of data is stored in digital way. Taking into consideration the fact that
spying is one of the second oldest job, people always wanted to know what his
opponent was doing, the transfer of espionage in virtual domain should not be perceived
as strange. There is a division on the government against government spying and
government against private companies spying, that rose up more controversies. The
most active in spying in the Internet is China, which is chasing the Western World,
especially the United States. The classical way of achieving the same position is too
slow and in order to speed it up, the Chinese authorities decided to develop cyberspies
teams. They achieved several success. In operation Titan Rain lasting since 2003 to
2005 Chinese hackers stole hundreds of documents from the military installations,
military industry sector and even NASA [16, p. 1-11] . Since 2006 till 2011 the next big
cyberespionage operation took place – Shady RAT, where networks 72 organization
will be infiltrated [17]. However, the number of spying organization for different
countries constantly rose up. According to the last report CrowdStrike Global Threat
more than 50 organizations are engaged in this precedence. The employer of some of
them was not identified. But the one of the most active groups was Russian Energetic
Bear especially interested in the Western energy sector [18, p.2]. The biggest victim of
the cyberspies activity is the United States. The former head of National Security
Agency (NSA) general Keith B. Alexander describes the phenomena of cyberespionage
as the greatest transfer of wealth in human history. It is difficult to estimate the financial
loses as the consequences of it but it amounts approximately 250 billion a year in the
United States only [19]. In addition it has a serious future aftermath because China
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through the cyberspies came closer to American dominant position in field of
technology and military, which can undermine the current geopolitical order.
The cyberespionage has also influenced the average Internet users, and evoked
fear about the private data caused by the Edward Snowden revelation about the spying
practices of the NSA. According to him the United States mined information from every
possible sources including the main computer companies.
The cyberespionage is a real problem for countries, private sector and individuals
and constituted the serious threat in cyberspace. It is hard to imagine setting any
limitations on this phenomena or regulate this with international treaty and rather more
and more countries will develop own units of cyberspies.
Cybercrime
Since the beginning of the popularization of thr Internet criminals were very
active and used all sources to exploit the lack of knowledge of the average Internet users
and their gullibility. In 90s the single, talented hackers dominated the field of stealing
money through the usage of the Internet. It was intrinsically linked with the massive
popularization of the credit card and, at the beginning, the lack of the adequate
protections. In 21st century these activities became treated as the separated branch of IT
business. Max “Iceman” Butler who stole data from more than two billions of credit
card and created a cybermafia consisted of thousands of hackers all other the world is
the most clear example of talented person, who used hi skill to hostile activity in
cyberspace [20]. There were also special websites, where the cybercriminal exchanged
each other the codes and strips for credit cards. The most famous was known as the
Dark Market, where buyers can purchase card details, malware programs or order
carring out DDoS attacks. There were even courses teaching how to hack a bank
account or steal data from credit cards. The cheapest services cost 3 dollars when the
most expensive amounts to $7,000 like the skimmer devices. Dark Market website was
closed by FBI action in 2008 but it is plausible that other this kind of forums existed in
the Internet [21].
What is more, the biggest cybercriminal organizations were created especially on
the post-Soviet territory where a lot of young people felt a hunger for ITC knowledge.
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The most famous among them was the Russian Business Network. There is little certain
information about this organization, even the date of creation is not clear. They became
the best among others in the cybercrime branch. They are often called the FSB warriors
to stress the linkage with Russian specials services. They offered a bulletproof hosting,
sophisticated operation in cyberspace and many othe [22].
The cybercrime has been popular since the popularization of the Internet, because
it was a very easy way to earn a lot of money and the probability of being caught was
lesser than in the real world. This fact stem from the architecture of the cyberspace.
According to Norton Report 2013 the losses caused by the activity of cybercriminal
amounts to sum 113 billions of dollars and rose from the previous year for 3 billion
The cybercrime will develop inevitably in the form of talented individuals and also as
organized crime. The new tools and methods of attack will be found and now they focus
on exploiting the vulnerabilities in smartphones. It seems that the gold era for
cybercrime is coming, as more and more people use banking online and paying using
smartphones. Taking consideration the lack of basic knowledge about the security, they
are very vulnerable to the emerging threats [24]. The growing activity of the
cybercriminal could have a negative impact on the using online method of payment,
which will have a detrimental effect on banks and will complicate the life of average
users.
Conclusion
The mentioned examples perfectly illustrate the current trend in threats in
cyberspace. The well known and popularized not only by media but also by bunch of
researchers threats like cyberterrorism or cyberwar never happened before and should
be treated as emerging threat, that may appear in future. However, this situation causes
that the cyberthreats are underestimated and perceived as the challenge for future. This
misconception cause that the real and existed threats are overlooked and ignored
although cyberespionage and cybercrime bring serious financial losses and harm for
intellectual property. The necessity to recalibrate the public discussion about this
problem exists because the victims in cyberspace consists often from average computer
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users and it is necessary to provide basic knowledge to them about threats, which could
be the best remedy to decrease the number of cybercrime and cyberespionage incidents.
Endnotes:
According to the definition of NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of
Excellence, “cyberspace is more than the Internet, including not only
hardware, software and information systems, but also people and social
interaction within these networks”.
The Internet is a global network created at the beginning of 60s in 20th century.
Firstly, it was projected as a tool to allow fast exchange of information
between the military bases in the United States, then was used to communicate
between the universities.
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