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Technology

CIA Overseeing 3-Day War Game on Internet

May 26, 2005 -"Silent Horizon," a three-day war game is being conducted now to test the ability of government and industry to respond to escalating Internet disruptions. The CIA is in charge of the operation. Details are not known.

Source:NewsMax

Anti-virus software losing fight against computer infection

Sept. 3, 2003 - Matthew Williamson, a Hewlett-Packard researcher warns that current methods of spotting and stopping computer viruses are inadequate. By the time a patch is devised and distributed, infections like the Slammer, MSBlaster and SoBig, will have already been affected. The next generation of viruses will be even more rapid.

One called Flash Worm could infect an entire PC network within 15 seconds, while a type called the Warhol Worm could spread worldwide within just 15 minutes.

Source:Yahoo/ AP - From New Scientist

Klez: The Virus That Won't Die?

July 8, 2002 - A new version of the Klez worm is infecting many computers. Klez has been around for seven months already. It can do serious damage to one's computer, is very hard to stop, and illustrates the dangers ahead for even worse cyber-attacks.

Source:PC World

New worm infects the net

Aug. 6, 2001 - Code Red II may be more effective, but those who have patched their systems against Code Red are safe. It only targets machines using Windows 2000 and running Microsoft Internet Information Server (IIS). +

Source: BBC

'Code Red' Effects Go Undetected

Aug. 1, 2001 - There were not immediate problems on the Internet caused by the "Code Red" worm, but Alan Paller, director of research at the SANS Institute, a computer security think-tank, says that the original attack seven days to hit its stride, and we won't know for sure for another seven days that the crisis is past.

Source: Washington Post

Update - Aug. 2 - Code Red threat tailing off - The worm has attacked over 180,000 computers now, but is slowing down. - BBC

Today: Internet Worm - Code Red Alert

July 31, 2001 - A Very Real and Present Threat to the Internet

The Code Red infection is expected to strike again tonight, spreading rapidly throughout the Internet. On July 19, 2001, the worm infected more than 250,000 systems in just 9 hours. Tonight's activity could be massive enough to cause Internet outages.

Who Must Act? Every organization or person who has Windows NT or Windows 2000 systems AND the IIS web server software may be vulnerable. IIS is installed automatically for many applications. If you are using Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Me, there is no action that you need to take in response to this alert.

What To Do If You Are Vulnerable

1.To rid your machine of the current worm, reboot your computer.

2.To protect your system from re-infection, install Microsoft's patch for the Code Red vulnerability problem:

Windows NT version 4.0:
http://www.microsoft.com/Downloads/Release.asp?ReleaseID=30833

Windows 2000 Professional, Server and Advanced Server:
http://www.microsoft.com/Downloads/Release.asp?ReleaseID=30800

Step-by-step instructions for these actions are posted at www.digitalisland.net/codered

Microsoft's description of the patch and its installation, and the vulnerability it addresses is posted at http://www.microsoft.com/technet/treeview/default.asp?url=/technet/security/bulletin/MS01-033.asp

Source: Carnegie Mellon Institute

Cyberwar the coming threat

July 2, 2001 - More than 30 countries now have well developed programs for waging computer war

Source: BBC

Russia, China Working on Cyber Warfare -US Official

June 21, 2001 - Lawrence Gershwin, the national intelligence officer for science and technology, told Congress' Joint Economic Committee that Russia and China appear to be developing computer-based tools with the potential to do long-lasting harm to the U.S. economy.

Source: Yahoo News

Hacking 'is now bigger threat than terrorism'

Mar. 30, 2001 - British Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook warned that cybercrime could cause more damage than a military strike or a terrorist campaign.

He said that the electronic technology controlling essential services such as water, power and transport had become a leading target for terrorists and other groups who wanted to disrupt the life of the nation.

Mr Cook gave a graphic account of how terrorists or anti-capitalist protesters could wreak havoc in a modern economy such as Britain's if they managed to gain access to the computer systems of the key public services.

Source: Electronic Telegraph

Everything Hacked but the Budget

Feb. 17, 2000 - Attorney General Janet Reno and the FBI plan to use the recent cyber attacks as an excuse to impose more governmental control and surveillance, funded by larger appropriations.

Source: Wired News

When states go to cyber war

Feb. 16, 2000 - A short fictional scenario about the "First World Wide Web War" set in the near future envisions the destruction of utilities, transportation, banking, and telecommunications in a short, mysterious war on the Internet.

The kind of disruption once possible only with a battery of intercontinental missiles now seems achievable at the click of a mouse.

Source: BBC

Revealed: German behind Net chaos

Feb. 14, 2000 - A 20 year old German, known only as Mixter, supplied the software used by last week's attack against E-commerce sites on the Internet. The program is called Tribal Flood Network. He denounced the actual use of his program last week as pointless.

The Observer

Also: Justice Dept Warning about Tribal Flood Network- Dec. 30, 1999

Cyber attacks traced to California

Feb. 12, 2000 - Computers at the University of California at Stanford and Santa Barbara were involved in the recent attacks of E-commerce sites, but it is still unknown who is responsible.

Source: BBC

U.S. Vows to Go After Internet Vandals

Feb. 9, 2000 - For three days major E-commerce sites have been shut down by being flooded with communications from hundreds of computers, while operators of those computers had no knowledge of the attack. It is possible that the massive operation was all controlled by one person whose identity and location are hidden.

The attacks began Monday against Yahoo Inc., the largest independent Web site, then spread Tuesday to leading retailers Buy.com Inc., eBay Inc., Amazon.com Inc. Time Warner Inc.'s CNN.com news site.

On Wednesday the online brokerage E-Trade Group Inc., and a technology news site ZDNet Inc were targeted

U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno has announced a criminal investigation into the matter, though " law enforcement officials conceded they had scant idea of who or what they were up against."

Yahoo Full Coverage of Hacker Attacks

Space Command readies for infowar

Jan. 6, 2000 - This coming October, the United States Space Command will assume the lead for military computer network attacks.

Genreal Richard Meyer likened the current use of computer attack tools to the early introduction of aircraft into warfighting.

Source:UPI

Internet warfare concerns admiral

From article by Bill Gertz

Nov. 18, 1999 - Vice Adm. Thomas Wilson, the new director of the Defense Intelligence Agency says they have set up a special joint task force known as the Computer Defense Network.

Yesterday a Chinese report claimed that the People's Liberation Army (PLA) is gearing up for wartime computer attacks on networks and the Internet.

The Chinese report appeared Thursday in the Liberation Army Daily, official newspaper of the Communist Party-run political department of the PLA. It coincided with other statements by Chinese military leaders in recent weeks about China's growing offensive military capabilities.

Source: Washington Times

Russian hackers steal US weapons secrets

July 25, 1999 - Security experts warn that America may be losing the world's first "cyber war". For the past six months, while we have been preoccupied with fixing the Y2K problem, extensive cyper-attacks have occured at many military and commercial computing centers via the internet. Officials fear that Russia may have stolen some of the nation's most sensitive military secrets, including weapons guidance systems and naval intelligence codes. They refer to the intelligence offensive as Operation Moonlight Maze.

American experts have long warned of a "digital Pearl Harbor" in which an enemy exploits America's reliance on computer technology to steal secrets or spread chaos as effectively as any attack using missiles and bombs.

Source:The Sunday Times (UK)/ WorldNetDaily

Can We Buy Back Our Supercomputer, Please?

July 23, 1999 - A supercomputer used in nuclear research was supposedly sold for use as spare parts, but is apparently being refurbished for use by the Chinese in their own nuclear program.

Now DOE officials are engaged in a standoff with the purchaser and endeavoring desperately to persuade him to sell the system back to Sandia for $2.5 million. However, he is proving intransigent.

Source:Insight On The News Online (Story no longer on line.)

COX REPORT

Unclassified version of the report about Chinese espionage. Source: CNN Interactive

China blames US carelessness for nuclear espionage

April 30, 1999 - Forced by circumstances to admit that they had obtained virtually all our nuclear secrets, Chinese officials blamed the situation on simple American carelessness. The Chinese Foreign Ministry said:

"If there has been a leak of secrets, that is their own affair . . . We have never stolen nuclear or military secrets from the United States." It was for America to decide whether it should tighten security procedures.

Apparent translation: This information was GIVEN to us.

Source: Electronic Telegraph

Kosovo Antagonists Wage Net War

April 10, 1999 - Use of the Internet is a significant part of the war:

Banned B29 Radio station moved its broadcasts to the Internet:

Yugoslavian government information

US Defense Department information

Source: Yahoo News (Story no longer on line)

Information Warfare

March, 1999 - This Popular Mechanics' article is about the danger of disruption of military and other critical coumputer systems. It shows how vulnerable we are to hackers. It also asks the question, since it is such a threat to our security, will the United States strike first? Some say that we have already done so through chips programmed by the NSA and installed in computers for foreign use.

German Army Gen. Klaus Naumann corroborated the existence of a Pentagon program. In an interview published in Aviation Week & Space Technology last year, he acknowledged that NATO was developing its own IW capability. He said that until that capability came online the Western alliance would rely on the Pentagon.