In 1834, thieves hacked the French Telegraph System to steal financial market information effectively making it the first cyber-attack. The world has come a long way from that, with the rapid evolution of technology, cyber-attacks have become commonplace with countries attacking other countries either directly or through state-sponsored groups to steal confidential data, target internet networks and power grids or in the case of North Korea which constantly uses cyber-attacks to gain access to financial resources to fund its nuclear program.
US-Russia
The US recently saw one of the largest cyberattacks to have ever taken place in the last five years. The attack is believed to have begun in October 2019 and the origins will likely take months to be investigated, as was stated by Deputy National Security Adviser, Anne Neuberger. The attack which targeted nine federal agencies (as of February) and 100 private sector companies, including the nuclear weapons agency and Microsoft. Some officials believe it to have been initiated from within the United States and some say Russia is likely the place of origin. The attack compromised a program by SolarWinds, a Texas-based company and targeted about 18,000 customers which received malicious codes through updates to the software. U.S officials said hackers used “other methods” as well to infiltrate networks besides SolarWinds.
Joe Biden in a speech on 4th February said that the US “will not hesitate to raise the cost on Russia.” Weeks later, in a report it was found that the US was preparing to retaliate and would do it very soon. The action would involve a combination of economic sanctions and an executive order from the president to accelerate the hardening of the federal government. In response to the report, the Kremlin said that the retaliation would constitute “international crime.”
One interesting fact to note is the recent and rapid escalation in cyberwarfare, which seems to become overt rather than covert, with countries openly challenging each other. This will prove to be a major challenge for the Biden administration, his stance on Russia and China.
Ukraine-Russia
Ukraine State Security Service on 16th March said that they had blocked a “large-scale hacker attack against Ukraine’s government resources.” They claimed that a group known as “Armageddon” an FSB-controlled group was behind the attack and attacked with the intention to gain access to “secret data of the supreme public authorities of Ukraine.“ This comes three weeks after Ukraine accused Russia of targeting “Ukrainian security and defense websites.” At the time of writing, the FSB has not made any comments on the allegations.
Ukraine has also accused Russia of launching a “hybrid-war”, with conventional conflict taking place in Donbass and constant cyberattacks on its state institutions.
However, it is if these attacks can be coupled with the rising tensions in the Donbass region, which has seen the arrival of heavy military equipment in the past few days and weeks.
China-India
Indo-China ties which have been on the edge since the Doklam crisis, further strained with the skirmishes that took place in Ladakh and saw 20 Indian fatalities and some Chinese fatalities. The two countries claimed to have de-escalated the situation.
In a recent report, it was found that RedEcho, a group that allegedly has links to China, might have been targeting Indian power assets in the states of Maharashtra, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Assam, Karnataka, and the union territory of New Delhi. It is being speculated that these cyber-attacks came as a warning to India that China can switch off India’s lights whenever it wants.
Christopher Ahlberg, CEO of Recorded Future, the security outfit that detected these attacks said that 10 Indian power assets and two ports had come under the attack.
Conclusion
Cyber-attacks have become commonplace and how countries respond to these will be an interesting thing to note. It is likely that cyber defense will be the focus of the defense budgets of many countries and will constitute installing new security measures and reinforcing the current hardware to counter new threats.
Countries don’t like seeing their armed forces taking casualties and it is very likely that cyberwarfare will partially if not completely substitute conventional wars and conflict in the upcoming years.
Mehnoor Singh – freelance journalist covering conflict in Russia, CIS and Middle East. You can follow him on Twitter @mehnoorsingh_
