Collateral Damage From Cyber Warfare? 134
theodp writes "If you're thinking about applying for that open US cyber warfare czar position, Robert X. Cringely points out that you will have to effectively function as a world cyber warfare czar, a fact that neither Republican nor Democratic Administrations have yet been willing to embrace, at least in public. The international nature of today's outsourced-and-offshored IT business has big implications for US security. Try to do a security audit of your company's technical resources in Argentina or Bangladesh, suggests Bob, and see what nightmare is unveiled. Toss some random Code Gods into the mix, says Cringely, and it's really too tough to predict who might win in a game of US vs. Albania."
Re:Hmmm... (Score:3, Insightful)
But how will the rich hold on to their power and privilege if there is a real free market in labor, and workers can move wherever pays the most?
Re:Hmmm... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Hmmm... (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe it is time to end this man-made idiocy of nations and borders?
That's a great idea, let's make the UN a real world government with the authority and ability to enforce laws. And to make sure the laws are reasonably and fairly enforced, we'll get the Human Rights Council to oversee that (you know the one that has China and Cuba on it--such fine upstanding respecters of human rights).
I propose the opposite... (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm tired of the resources of my nation being used to protect the world. I would really rather see our Cyber Czar take the opposite approach:
Secure our stuff, and let the rest of the world deal with their own problems in the way they best see fit.
This would require a moderate paradigm shift, to be sure, for example:
1) US-based corps that choose to outsource will need to factor this into their costs. Perhaps a US-based callcenter, backed by our security efforts, would be a better investment.
2) The original concept of the 'net would need to be reinstated - where if one or many nodes go down, the bulk of it remains functional.
3) Vendors inside the US would need to be encouraged to step it up and provide equivalent IT products to those available overseas. ...and so on, and so on...
I propose we look at the US in much the way any Security Pro looks at his sponsoring company. I can't be concerned with securing everyone on my same internet subnet. That's their deal. I wouldn't propose to use services and resources on those (presumably unsecured) nodes. Only my own IP's are my concern. The opposite is insanity, and is simply not in the best interests of those paying my paycheck. Same for our government, IMHO.
Likewise, where exactly in the Constitution is 'policing Pakistan's internet' supported? Are we still talking about the Commerce Clause? Because at some point it is going to logically fail. You can't just keep expanding power without putting paper behind it, unless we're ready to scrap the whole notion of a common set of national guidelines for what our government should and should not be.
Re:how many fallacies can we count? (Score:5, Insightful)
1.) Nationalism is an invention of the rich intended to make the poor support the interests of the rich. To the poor, one lord is much the same as the next, why should they care who rules them?
2.) Ah, I see. Rules on paper make a free market. Rules that let the rich move their business wherever labor is cheapest, but does not let labor move where the pay is the best.
3.) You've just described how the free market is supposed to work.
Re:Hmmm... (Score:5, Insightful)
You have H1-B visas so the rich can hire Indians, who don't have the high prices we do.
Actually, free trade means you can ship the work off to be done, so you don't even have to hire anyone, just contract.
They use Mexicans here illegally to do jobs that Americans would do if they were paid appropriately.
That's not really free trade either, it's slavery-plus. You underpay the workers, it's actually cheaper than housing them and trying to keep them healthy, and make a return on your investment. At the end of their period of employment you can just deport them and even skip a payment. You don't even have to whip anybody.
In a world you describe it would be a lot easier for the rich to hold their power and privelege. Why do you think the rich lobby for things like NAFTA?
NAFTA is not a free trade agreement, name to the contrary.
If you can come up with some actual examples of large-volume free trade in the USA, I'll be interested. I don't think you can.
Idiots. Outsourcing, offshoring etc irrelevant (Score:2, Insightful)
Who would win in any given matchup are underground groups. not any countries. no resources a formal government is able to muster can top the able hackers of underground scenes. this has been the case all along. us, china, russia, any of them has been hacked by these people wantonly, at will. neither this will change with applicatio of a 'cybersecurity tzar' or any such absurd official, or mustering of millions of $ and hundreds of men in any country's 'cyberwarfare unit'.
hacking, cracking, infiltration, security et al - these all require huge talent in their highest levels (im not talking about phishing or script kiddying), and curiously this type of talent is found in the most rebellious, unruly minds of any society. good luck to you in recruiting those to any government's 'cybersecurity team'. if one thing is in common in these types, its their mutual hatred of any kind of establishment.
am i one of them ? no. but i can appreciate talent, and i can see cold hard truth as it is.
Why the hell do we accept Cringley articles? (Score:5, Insightful)
The man is a tremendous douche who always writes ridiculous articles so that people get their dander up and drive traffic. He's nothing more than a journo-troll.
And this whole cyber-crap thing misses the mark. First off, nix the cyber. Nothing makes you sound less knowledgeable than using cyber when talking about computers. Second off, computer warfare is just another way of fucking with the enemy's infrastructure. If anything, you could classify it a subset of cold warfare. That's anything that's indirect, doesn't involve the acting killing of others, but is a true struggle between nations. Economic warfare is the usual manifestation with trade wars, resource wars, and political maneuvering. It's not some crazy new thing that's all black leather and sexy computer chicks.
Did you steal info from a poorly-secured computer system? Great, that's just digital espionage. You could have sent a guy in with a camera to photograph stuff 30 years ago but you did it with a computer now. Same idea, different tools. Did you crash his telcom system? Great. Could have been done with a saboteur 30 years ago (generally poor luck with that sort of thing) but you managed it from your desk. Excellent.
While there will always be security holes in software, most of this exposure can be mitigated against with simple, sensible procedures. The thing we tend to forget is real life ain't like Hollywood. It may be cool in Chuck to think that a guy with a supercomputer armband can hijack a Predator whenever he feels like it but that's not reality. It may be cool to think that a hacker could pick any target he wants and break in but it's usually more a matter of running scripts and finding holes where you can get them, very luck of the draw.
When it comes to infrastructure attacks, I'm far less concerned with computer attacks. Throughout this country, we have a number of single points of failure that would be difficult to replace. Any civil engineer could draw up a hitlist in five minutes far more knowledgeable than I'm going to suggest here.
1. Long-haul transmission lines. It wouldn't take that much explosive to bring a tower down and they're often running through isolated areas. Knock a few towers down, then we're stuck spending billions to guard the rest.
2. While everyone is preoccupied with towers, hit the ...crap, I'm forgetting the name. My memory is wonky here but there's some expensive stuff used in electrical distribution that has very long lead times for ordering replacements. Blow up one of these, it could be a year before the new one arrives.
3. While everyone is preoccupied with that, send a few Lee Malvo teams to randomly snipe people around the country. Doesn't matter that the average commuter is ten times more likely to die in a crash that day than get sniped, everyone will panic.
4. While everyone is preoccupied with snipers, one of the other soft targets can be hit. Seriously, one electrical line failing took out New York. Making that happen again would have to be easier than plots like blowing up tanker trucks in the tunnels.
By all means, let's protect the computers but it's attacks like I've outlined above that I think would prove far more deadly. Of course, if I were the terrorist, I'd rather fart around with computer attacks from the safety of my cave than risk entering the target country but that's just me. I think people should be ridiculed for their political views, not killed. I'd make a lousy terrorist.
Re:nationalism is an invention of the rich? (Score:4, Insightful)
Who benefits from nationalist sentiment in China and Russia? The rich. Oh, sure, not EVERY rich person, some get skewered by it, but it is still part of the owning class game, a manipulation of the populace, to get them to cheer on their own oppressors.
"He may be a greedy, oppressive bastard, but he's OUR greedy, oppressive bastard!" is the sentiment that nationalism encourages. Really, it's a means of getting the oppressed to lay down their lives defending their oppressors from other oppressors.
Re:Hmmm... (Score:1, Insightful)
they are not completely eroding the market they are competing in, a market which employs tens of millions of people.
That argument would be a lot more convincing if 475k out of the 500k weren't in one industry, that the vast majority weren't controlled by a handful of companies, and if the "market" was really 10 million rather than the closer estimate of 4 million. 8-10% of the work force can seriously warp the playing field.
Re:Hmmm... (Score:4, Insightful)
Are you sure that we aren't suited to being the world police? Our police state techniques are pretty damn good. We have a higher percentage of our population incarcerated or otherwise caught up in the penal system (parole and probation) than any other developed country. I'd say that when it comes to disenfranchising huge portions of the population, we're doing pretty darn well.
How do you prevent change in a political system? Strip the rights of everyone who runs afoul of it and might be inclined to change it.
Re:moron, get an education (Score:3, Insightful)
Funny how none of your examples ended up benefiting the poor, and simply ended up trading one set of oppressors for another. But that couldn't have been on purpose, nope.
exactly (Score:2, Insightful)
and whatever you are fighting for would equally be eventually corrupted and serve only an entrenched aristocracy, and equally require revolution in order to right injustices. this is the inevitable cycle of history. every revolution is fought by the commoners in the name of righting injustice by the ruling class, and every revolution eventually decays into nothing more than a new ruling class. this observation applies equally to whatever the hell you think you are fighting for
that's why its called history, moron, you should study it someday, you would learn this. it has valuable things to teach you about your own beliefs
instead, you naively and ignorantly believe that you are the only person who has ever thought to fight for something that could never be corrupted. you really believe you are immune to the lessons of history? then you more than anyone else are doomed to repeat history
as you well understand, communism in china and russia was fought for by peasants against the rich, in exactly the same ecstatic belief that corruption by the rich aristocracy was now finally being defeated forever. what happened? they merely stayed poor, and merely served a new aristocracy. i mean it is a cosmic joke that the most ultracapitalist country on the planet right now is ruled by the chinese communist party, an ideology supposedly diametrically opposed to capitalism. what a farce!
you really should study history, you're quite green. for your sake, i hope you are 13 years old. ideologically, you are only 13 years old, if not actually chronologically 13 years old
Re:Hmmm... (Score:5, Insightful)
I have 9,826,630 square km (3,794,066 sq mi) I can hypothetically live in. But I don't have the freedom to live anywhere in that three million square miles, as I can't live without money. I'm living in Springfield because that's where I found work 20 years ago when I'd been out of a job for a while; I'd rather be living in the St Louis area, where I grew up. Maybe I'll move back there when I retire in a few years, but then again it will depend on money, too. Will I be able to sell my house? Will I be able to afford to buy one there?
Only independantly wealthy people have freedom to live where they want; the homeless do in theory, but in practice they don't have the money needed for travel.
I'm not the property of the state, I'm the property of my employer. The state is also the property of my (and your) employer. The world is and has always been owned and ruled by the very rich.
Re:Why the hell do we accept Cringley articles? (Score:5, Insightful)
There are very many easy-to-destroy terrorist targets all over the USA which would kill many people or cripple infrastructure for long periods of time. The fact that this doesn't happen continually is a testament to just how few real terrorists there are out there.
Re:how many fallacies can we count? (Score:3, Insightful)
Nothing can possibly be unnatural. It is important to remember that there is more to nature than competition. Cooperation is at least as important (although some would argue that cooperation is simply a competitive strategy.) Altruism is real, and genetically selected for, because it provides clear benefits to organisms that practice it.
Human nature is complex, and can not be defined outside of the environment humans are enmeshed in. If everyone has the means to punish unfairness and selfishness in others, and cooperation is rewarded, most people will be cooperative. On the other hand, no one likes being taken advantage of, so if people see unfairness and selfishness going unpunished, they will be selfish and unfair themselves.
Giving the keys to anyone (Score:2, Insightful)