What Is Cyberwarfare?
- What is cyberwarfare?
- Types of cyberwarfare
- Purpose of cyberwarfare
- Examples of cyberwarfare
- Difference between cybercrime and cyberwarfare
- Conclusion
What is Cyberwarfare?
Cyberwarfare and cybersecurity go hand in hand. Cyberwarfare can happen to organizations or other such entities. But, in general, it is used to attack a country’s core digital system. The core digital system usually consists of highly sensitive data; through cyberwarfare, such data is handled in a way by cyberwarfare wagers to disrupt a country’s overall security. In addition to harming a country’s security, there might be other digital risks for the country as well.
In brief, it would be correct to say that cyberwarfare uses cyberwar techniques to damage computer systems in the target country. Furthermore, it can lead to the death of people as well.
Cyberwarfare, generally, attacks a country’s financial infrastructure, public infrastructure, electrical systems, safety infrastructure, and military resources.
The following are the current types of cyberwarfare.
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Types of Cyberwarfare
On understanding what cyberwarfare is, you might understand that there are several types of cyberwarfare attacks and they vary in intensity. The following are the common types of attacks.
- DDOS: Distributed denial-of-service attack, popularly known as DDoS attack, makes computers inaccessible for target users. In the physical world, a DDoS attack is similar to the manipulation of wires to disrupt important conversations in a country’s security. DDoS attacks computers or networks with poor or insufficient security systems.
- Propaganda: It is an elaborate plan to manipulate or brainwash a country’s people via the press. The press includes online news platforms as well. Propaganda to control or shape people’s views against or in support of a certain incident or ideology.
- Economic disruption: A popular example of the economic disruption because of cyberwarfare is the 2017 attack in Ukraine and on the UK National Health Service. The cyberwarfare appeared to be ransomware but it caused high-scale damages to organizations. The goal of such an attack is to disrupt the overall economic situation of an organization or country in general.
- Surprise cyberattack: The purpose of a surprise cyberattack is to take down a country’s prestigious or important organizations by surprise to exhibit the attacker’s power. This type of cyberwarfare is categorized as a nontraditional form of cyberwarfare.
But, what is the main purpose of cyberwarfare? The following section will answer that.
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Purpose of Cyberwarfare
There are several purposes of cyberwarfare attacks. However, the following are a few of the most common purposes of these attacks. The following list answers the query what is cyberwarfare?, at a higher-level of understanding.
- Military: This is done to gain control of the target country’s military cyberspace.
- Civil: This is done to instill fear amid the people living in the target country.
- Hacktivism: This is done to spread a particular ideology among the people in the target country.
- Income generation: This is done to gain monetary benefits from the people living in the target country. Generally, financial institutions are looted via income generation cyberwarfare.
- Nonprofit research: Sometimes, cyberwarfare happens for the betterment of a country. For example, if the world is going through a crisis and a particular country has solutions for the same, the country usually implements them and shares the same with other countries as well for the betterment of the world, in general.
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Examples of Cyberwarfare
The following are a few notable, recent cyberwarfare attacks:
- In the year 1988, a worm, intended to be an experiment, led to computer repairs of US$100 millon. This gave birth to current day’s DDoS attacks. Robert Tappan Morris created the experimental worm at Cornell University, USA.
- The worm is popularly known as the Morris worm, deriving its name from its creator. Three teenagers in 1998 actively hacked up to 500 computers in the US; the computers included government systems as well. The attack affected the nation’s IT infrastructure to a very large extent. This cyberwarfare is popularly known as the case of Solar Sunrise. The name is derived from the fact that Sun Solaris was the common operating system in all hacked computers.
- In the year 2009, Google, the search engine giant, encountered the problem of cyberwarfare. Though China has strict internet access rules, Google was offered permission to capitalize on the internet usage to a certain extent. On realizing that their server has been breached by the Chinese government, Google had to move from .cn to Hong Kong to prevent further damages. The attack included accessing emails of people in the US, China, and Europe.
The above-mentioned are a few examples of cyberwarfare that cost millions. And, the following are the most common attacks that you should be aware of.
Currently, the most common cyberwarfare attack is malware. Malware cyberwarfare is a method where you will be sent a malicious link with convincing authenticity. By clicking the link, your accounts, system, or anything of such nature will be hacked. By entering the system, the malware will be able to install harmful software, steal sensitive or confidential information, and much more.
But, how is cybercrime different from cyberwarfare? The following section will answer.
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Difference between Cybercrime and Cyberwarfare
- Cybercrime is illegal, and is always done because of criminal motives. However, cyberwarfare can be done for the betterment of a country as well.
- The effect of cybercrime is psychological, while the effect of cyberwarfare is at the national or international level; the latter involves commercial exploitation in most cases.
But, how exactly did the evolution of cyberwarfare in today’s world happen? The history and evolution of cyberwarfare is quite interesting as well. It initially began with experiments, but with the development of technologies, its impact has grown as well. Currently, in general, cybercrime affects over USD one trillion of the global economy.
Conclusion
The future of cyberwarfare attacks are predicted to be used as a major cyberwar technique. It is also predicted that artificial intelligence will be involved in future cyberwarfare strategies.
To conclude, the ever growing cyberwarfare technologies are used for both good and bad motives. With the growing anti-cyberwarfare technologies, it can be expected that there might be solid solutions to deal with cyberwarfare techniques used for ill motives.
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