President Barack Obama has developed guidelines for how the U.S. should respond to–and initiate–cyberattacks, the Associated Press is reporting.
Citing anonymous defense officials, the news service claims the guidelines include a wide range of cyberwar efforts to be employed by the U.S. during both peacetime and when conflicts are underway, including installing viruses on international computers and taking down a country’s electrical grid.
According to the Associated Press, the guidelines also allow for defense officials to transmit code through another country’s network to ensure the connection can be made. Though it wouldn’t necessarily carry a dangerous payload at the time, that connection could be used in the future if an attack was authorized on the specific country.
The Associated Press’ report on the president’s cyberwar guidelines comes just a week after the Chinese military called on its government to invest in more defense against the U.S.
“The U.S. military is hastening to seize the commanding military heights on the Internet, and another Internet war is being pushed to a stormy peak,” the Chinese military wrote in its official newspaper, Liberation Army Daily. “Their actions remind us that to protect the nation’s Internet security, we must accelerate Internet defense development and accelerate steps to make a strong Internet army.”
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June 24th, 2011 12:02 am
The cyber war is definitely getting some traction – cyber war policy guideline seems like a reaction to high profile incidents in last few months. In information security arena you win the race when you are proactive NOT reactive. Strategically every nation understand that cyber war is a tool which can have more wide spread effects than a daisy cutter.
Strategically every nation understand that cyber war is a tool which can have more wide spread effects than a daisy cutter.