The New War Frontier... Cyberspace?: The Cyber Attack on US and South Korea
Ok, we knew it would happen sooner or later, but for it to happen in 2009, is news!
...Cyber criminals are using the Internet as their medium for war between and among countries...
The latest perpetrators? - allegedly, the North Koreans, whose hackers or sympathizers, have been having a field-day with prominent websites and blogs in the USA and South Korea, since the July 4 weekend!
These criminals have successfully launched denial of service attacks on these websites and blogs, virtually slowing or shutting down these sites.
[How denial-of-service attacks, work, is that hackers identify compromised computers (those without sufficient anti-virus/anti-spam protection).
They use these computers to form a botnet..a number of Internet computers, that, although their owners are unaware of it, have been set up to forward transmissions (usually spam or viruses) to targeted computers on the Internet.
The botnet is then used to forward viruses and/or spam to one unsuspecting Internet computer/webserver (a computer hosting thousands of websites) attached to the botnet.
The botnet floods this computer with so much bad traffic (or bad server requests) that the computer slows down or halts (causing the websites that it hosts, to also slow down under the strain).
Thus leaving the webserver incapable of responding to legitimate server requests].
According to articles, Officials: N Korea believed behind cyber attacks and South Korea Hit With Another Round of Cyber Attacks :
"In the U.S., the websites of the White House, the New York Stock Exchange, the Pentagon, the Department of Homeland Security, the Federal Aviation Commission, the Secret Service, the Washington Post, the Treasury Department, the Federal Trade Commission and the Transportation Department were all down at varying points over the July 4 holiday weekend and into this week, according to American officials inside and outside the government.
Whilst in South Korea, at least eleven (11) major Web sites have been affected by the attacks, including sites for the Office of the President, the Defense Ministry, the National Assembly, Shinhan Bank, the newspaper Chosun Ilboand Naver.com".
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Well, if these attacks were really from North Korea, then North Korean President, Kim Jong-il, must be pleased with himself...
He knew that if he tried to launch a missile attack on the USA, then the whole world, including NATO, would be bombing North Korea with such force that he'd be wetting himself and hiding in one of his underground barracks.
So he did the next best thing: he hit the economic power base of the US and every connected country in the world - through the medium that connects them all - the Internet.
Now, some of the US security experts who have been brought in to analyze the situation and restore the sites back to normalcy, have been downplaying these attacks...saying that "Kim Jong-il used these attacks to make a statement and so he may not go this route again...
...For if he really wanted to create damage...there would be better ways to do it".
But this man is not to be underestimated.
If Kim Jong-il has proven anything...he's relentless at trying to bring the US into war and adamant at disregarding UN War Treaty agreements.
This little man will stop at nothing to instigate war...and is not to be played with.
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Well, according to the above articles, normalcy was restored, within hours, to the South Korean sites affected..
We are not certain of the recovery time for the American websites and blogs, although article, South Korea Hit With Another Round of Cyber Attacks, states that:
1) The US government and private sector need to ensure that security patches are implemented within 30 days of their release
2) Glaring weaknesses in US cyber infractsructure, need to be addressed immediately.
What is certain, though, is that US and South Korean government departments and private sector need to take computer and Internet security seriously and follow the advice of experts who are effective at fighting cyber wars.
Accordingly, Barack Obama and the US government must appoint immediately, that cybersecurity czar that Barack Obama stated that he would appoint on May 29.
Until then, computers in the USA remain vulnerable and may expose vulnarabilities in other computers, globally.
(I would like to thank Eric Lafforgue for the use of his Flickr inset photo above of a Korean young man, at a computer, with the photo of Kim Jong-il watching over him).
Gillian
Sources Include
1) Article, "South Korea Hit With Another Round of Cyber Attacks" by Stefanie Hoffman, ChannelWeb.com, July 9,2009
2) Article,"Officials: N Korea believed behind cyber attacks", by HYUNG-JIN KIM, Associated Press, Wednesday, July 8,2009
3) Article, "Governments hit by cyber attack", BBC Technology News, July 8,2009
4) Article, "Obama Says He Will Name National CyberSecurity Advisor", by Ellen Nakashima and Brian Krebs, Washington Post Staff Writers, The Washington Post, May 30,2009
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