[Senasivar]

The Cyber-Threat Grows by John P. Avlon, City Journal Autumn 2009

I tend to follow a lot of this and I have said for years that if the US treated its networks/Internet like sovereign ground, there would have been a declaration of war years ago.

[dserbokim]

It sounds like they finally got around to watching Die Hard 4

It's also more fear-mongering from the Manhattan Institute, the same people who compared Le Corbusier to Pol Pot.

[Senasivar]

It sounds like they finally got around to watching Die Hard 4

It's also more fear-mongering from the Manhattan Institute, the same people who compared Le Corbusier to Pol Pot.

If you think it isn't accurate and just fear mongering, you are more than welcome to dispute the issues raised.

[dserbokim]

Sure: the article sets up a nightmare situation where a coordinated attack takes out multiple systems at the same time. Then it starts talking about "lone gunman" "hacktivists".

See the logical disconnect there?

[Senasivar]

Sure: the article sets up a nightmare situation where a coordinated attack takes out multiple systems at the same time. Then it starts talking about "lone gunman" "hacktivists".

See the logical disconnect there?

Nope.

[dserbokim]

It's really simple: to pull off a major coordinated attack like the one described in the opening paragraph of that piece, you'd need dozens if not hundreds of hackers all working in concert and all achieveing their goals at the same time on the same day.

This would be a serious threat if hackers were coordinated, social people who could be organized to do such a thing.

But as the article admits, hackers are loners, and those who actually have hacked sites and/or caused disruption or damage acted alone.

Also, organized hacking would be a great potential danger if hacking were a teachable skill, which it is not.

[Senasivar]

It's really simple: to pull off a major coordinated attack like the one described in the opening paragraph of that piece, you'd need dozens if not hundreds of hackers all working in concert and all achieveing their goals at the same time on the same day.

This would be a serious threat if hackers were coordinated, social people who could be organized to do such a thing.

But as the article admits, hackers are loners, and those who actually have hacked sites and/or caused disruption or damage acted alone.

Also, organized hacking would be a great potential danger if hacking were a teachable skill, which it is not.

The article did not admit hackers are loners. Did you also pass over the whole part about organized security breaches from China?

Also, a security concern can be from a lone person or a coordinated group. I don't see how even arguing over that point has anything to do with the security issues raised. You are discounting the whole discussion because you don't like the theoretical worst case scenario?

Again, if you have anything to put forward disputing the security issue information, I would like to see it. Otherwise it looks like you are just trying to argue because you don't like the Manhattan Institute.

[dserbokim]

The article did not admit hackers are loners. Did you also pass over the whole part about organized security breaches from China?

I did indeed, and there's a vast difference between the subtlety it takes to hack into say eBay and the steal the personal information and credit card numbers of tens of thousand of users and the ham-fisted techniques the Chinese have employed in their attempts at cyber espionage .

Also, a security concern can be from a lone person or a coordinated group. I don't see how even arguing over that point has anything to do with the security issues raised. You are discounting the whole discussion because you don't like the theoretical worst case scenario? I'm discounting their worst case scenario as it is simply the plot of a recent Hollywood movie and has no basis in fact (certainly no basis supported by the article it heads). It's very similar in form to the Corbu article you posted: they lead with a sensationalistic opening paragraph which is completely unsupported by the rest of the piece.

If they're actually afraid of a massive, coordinated attack that takes down the systems they mentioned, all we have to do is look to the movie for the solution to prevent it:



Again, if you have anything to put forward disputing the security issue information, I would like to see it. Otherwise it looks like you are just trying to argue because you don't like the Manhattan Institute. I don't like the Manhattan Institute. In this case, they are also wrong, and have constructed a fear-mongering piece which doesn't actually logically support itself.

[Senasivar]

I don't like the Manhattan Institute. In this case, they are also wrong, and have constructed a fear-mongering piece which doesn't actually logically support itself.

And yet, you still have not put forth one thing that contradicts the issues they have raised.

By the way, there are a lot of cataclysmic Hollywood movies based on global warming. I guess under your logic we should discount all of that too because someone wrote some fictional movies about it.

[dserbokim]

And yet, you still have not put forth one thing that contradicts the issues they have raised.

Because they didn't raise any actual issue. There's no facts, nothing which is backed up or supported in that piece. It's just a bunch of statements. You chose to assume that they're true. I don't, because I happen to like proof before I get worked up.

By the way, there are a lot of cataclysmic Hollywood movies based on global warming. I guess under your logic we should discount all of that too because someone wrote some fictional movies about it. If someone started an article on global climate change by describing the plot of The Day after Tomorrow I would dismiss it out of hand as well.

[Precturge]

Sure: the article sets up a nightmare situation where a coordinated attack takes out multiple systems at the same time. Then it starts talking about "lone gunman" "hacktivists".

See the logical disconnect there?

No, I see how critics don't know much about technology.

In the cyber-world, a "coordinated attack" can be launched by just one person or a government or a list of governments. It really doesn't matter. All that matters is that one has access to a sufficiently large botnet or set of hosts, and, ideally, one with substantial segments located across different peers and interconnects, such that cutting or blocking one segments still does not do much to slow down the tidal flood of packets.

In fact, such an attack is typically much more easily coordinated by one individual than by many.