Pre-Emptive Cyber-Wars Begun They Have

Pre-Emptive Cyber-Wars Begun They Have (ZeroHedge, Feb 4, 2013):

As the world’s economic powers squabble over the intricacies of cause and effect in a vicious cycle of currency devaluation and domestic economic defense; it appears, NYTimes reports, that the US is leading the way in another direction. A secret legal review on the use of America’s growing arsenal of cyberweapons has concluded that President Obama has the broad power to order a pre-emptive strike if the United States detects credible evidence of a major digital attack looming from abroad – i.e. if we ‘suspect’ someone is going to hack us, we can hack them. In what appears to be Stuxnet’s bigger (and scarier) brother,one official noted, “there are levels of cyberwarfare that are far more aggressive than anything that has been used or recommended to be done.” New policies will also govern how the intelligence agencies can carry out searches of faraway computer networks for signs of potential attacks on the United States and, if the president approves, attack adversaries by injecting them with destructive code – even if there is no declared war. Cyberweaponry is the newest and perhaps most complex arms race under way, based in Cyber Command at The Pentagon, with the unspoken question being, ‘What are we going to do about China?’

Via NY Times
,

A secret legal review on the use of America’s growing arsenal of cyberweapons has concluded that President Obama has the broad power to order a pre-emptive strike if the United States detects credible evidence of a major digital attack looming from abroad, according to officials involved in the review.

Read morePre-Emptive Cyber-Wars Begun They Have

Secret Rules To Let Obama Order ‘Pre-Emptive’ Cyber Attacks

Secret rules to let Obama order ‘pre-emptive’ cyber attacks (PressTV, Feb 4, 2013):

A secret legal review on the use of America’s growing arsenal of cyberweapons has concluded that President Obama has the broad power to order a pre-emptive strike if the United States detects credible evidence of a major digital attack looming from abroad, according to officials involved in the review.

That decision is among several reached in recent months as the administration moves, in the next few weeks, to approve the nation’s first rules for how the military can defend, or retaliate, against a major cyberattack.

New policies will also govern how the intelligence agencies can carry out searches of faraway computer networks for signs of potential attacks on the United States and, if the president approves, attack adversaries by injecting them with destructive code – even if there is no declared war.

Read moreSecret Rules To Let Obama Order ‘Pre-Emptive’ Cyber Attacks

NSA Refuses To Release Secret Obama Directive On Cybersecurity

NSA Refuses To Release Secret Obama Directive On Cybersecurity (Infowars, Nov 21, 2012):

Order may allow military takeover of internet

The National Security Agency has refused to release details of a secret presidential directive which experts believe could allow the military and intelligence agencies to operate on the networks of private companies, such as Google and Facebook.

As we reported last week, an article in the Washington Post, cited several US officials saying that Obama signed off on the secret cybersecurity order, believed to widely expand NSA’s spying authorities, in mid-October.

“The new directive is the most extensive White House effort to date to wrestle with what constitutes an “offensive” and a “defensive” action in the rapidly evolving world of cyberwar and cyberterrorism.” the report states.

In response to the move, lawyers with the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request (PDF) demanding that the Obama administration make public the text of the directive.

Read moreNSA Refuses To Release Secret Obama Directive On Cybersecurity

Anonymous Leaks Personal Information Of 5,000 Israeli Officials

Anonymous leaks personal information of 5,000 Israeli officials (RT, Nov 18, 2012):

Internet hacktivist group Anonymous has declared cyberwar on Israel, posting personal data of five thousand Israeli officials online.

­The group used their Anonpaste.me site to address a message to the Israeli government before linking to the page with names, ID numbers and personal emails of 5,000 officials.

The message said: “It has come to our attention that the Israeli government has ignored repeated warnings about the abuse of human rights, shutting down the internet in Israel and mistreating its own citizens and those of its neighboring countries.”


(Screenshot from anonpaste.me)

The group also said “Israeli Gov. this is/will turn into a cyberwar.”

Earlier, the group hacked over 700 hundred Israeli websites, including the Bank of Jerusalem, the Israeli Defence Ministry, the IDF blog, the President’s official website and many others.

Most of the sites remain down.

Read moreAnonymous Leaks Personal Information Of 5,000 Israeli Officials

Iran Nuclear Plants Hit By Cyber Attack, Virus Plays AC/DC’s ‘Thunderstruck’ At Full Volume

From the article:

Their (AC/DC) songs were among the loud music played to detainees at the Guantanamo Bay prison facility in preparation for interrogations, the Associated Press reported in October 20009, citing the National Security Archive in Washington.

Let’s just say the US or Israel is really behind this cyber attack.

What would happen if Iran would do the same to us or Israel?


Iran Nuclear Plants Hit By Virus Playing AC/DC, Website Says (Bloomberg, July 25, 2012)

Iran’s nuclear facilities have suffered a cyber attack that shut down computers and played music from the rock band AC/DC, the F-Secure Security Labs website said.

A new worm targeted Iran’s nuclear program, closing down the “automation network” at the Natanz and Fordo facilities, the Internet security site reported, citing an e-mail it said was sent by a scientist inside Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization.

The virus also prompted several of the computers on site to play the song “Thunderstruck” by AC/DC at full volume in the middle of the night, according to the e-mail, part of which is published in English on the website.

Read moreIran Nuclear Plants Hit By Cyber Attack, Virus Plays AC/DC’s ‘Thunderstruck’ At Full Volume

Israel, US Collaborated In CREATION Of ‘Flame’ Virus (FOX News)

See also:

Flame Steals Data Even When Computers Are Not Connected To The Internet

Flame Virus Developed By U.S. Government

Kaspersky At Cyber Security Conference: ‘It’s Not Cyber War, It’s Cyber Terrorism And I’m Afraid It’s Just The Beginning Of The Game … I’m Afraid It Will Be The End Of The World As We Know It’

Kaspersky Lab: Flame And Stuxnet Virus Share Common Origin

Obama Ordered The Stuxnet Attack On Iran’s Nuclear Facilities – And Yes: This Is An Act Of War!

President Obama Ordered Stuxnet Attacks On Iran Nuclear Facilities

US And Israel Created Stuxnet, Lost Control Of It

Flame Super-Virus Threatening To Cripple Entire Nations Has ‘Hallmarks Of The NSA’


??Israel, US collaborated in creation of ‘Flame’ virus to slow Iran’s nuke efforts, report says (FOX News, June 19, 2012):

Israel and the United States collaborated in the development of the powerful computer virus dubbed the “Flame,” which briefly affected Iran’s key oil industry, an official with knowledge of the effort said.

The Washington Post reports that the massive piece of malware, which collected critical intelligence information from Iran, was created with the aim of slowing the country’s suspected nuclear weapon development.

The Worm.Win32.Flame threat, or “Flame” for short, was likely built by the same nation-state responsible for the Stuxnet virus that targeted Iran’s nuclear power plant in 2010. Many suspect Stuxnet was the work of Israeli intelligence.

Read moreIsrael, US Collaborated In CREATION Of ‘Flame’ Virus (FOX News)

Flame Virus Developed By U.S. Government

Related info:

Kaspersky Lab: Flame And Stuxnet Virus Share Common Origin

Kaspersky At Cyber Security Conference: ‘It’s Not Cyber War, It’s Cyber Terrorism And I’m Afraid It’s Just The Beginning Of The Game … I’m Afraid It Will Be The End Of The World As We Know It’

Obama Ordered The Stuxnet Attack On Iran’s Nuclear Facilities – And Yes: This Is An Act Of War!

President Obama Ordered Stuxnet Attacks On Iran Nuclear Facilities

US And Israel Created Stuxnet, Lost Control Of It

Flame Super-Virus Threatening To Cripple Entire Nations Has ‘Hallmarks Of The NSA’


Flame virus, most sophisticated malicious code ever seen, was developed by U.S. government (Natural News, June 12, 2012):

Anyone who has spent longer than a day on a computer knows how dangerous to your hard drive malware and other malicious code can be. Most of us have fallen victim to one or the other and have cursed the day the hacker who developed it was born.

Now, according to reports, some of the most sophisticated malicious code ever developed is a product of the United States government, leaving more than a few tech experts and analysts concerned that maybe now, Washington has become a bigger info-terrorist than some of the country’s worst enemies.

Read moreFlame Virus Developed By U.S. Government

Kaspersky At Cyber Security Conference: ‘It’s Not Cyber War, It’s Cyber Terrorism And I’m Afraid It’s Just The Beginning Of The Game … I’m Afraid It Will Be The End Of The World As We Know It’

Related info:

Flame Virus Developed By U.S. Government

Kaspersky Lab: Flame And Stuxnet Virus Share Common Origin

Obama Ordered The Stuxnet Attack On Iran’s Nuclear Facilities – And Yes: This Is An Act Of War!

President Obama Ordered Stuxnet Attacks On Iran Nuclear Facilities

US And Israel Created Stuxnet, Lost Control Of It

Flame Super-Virus Threatening To Cripple Entire Nations Has ‘Hallmarks Of The NSA’


Nations must talk to halt “cyber terrorism”: Kaspersky (Reuters, June 6, 2012):

Eugene Kaspersky, whose lab discovered the Flame virus that has attacked computers in Iran and elsewhere in the Middle East, said on Wednesday only a global effort could stop a new era of “cyber terrorism”.

It’s not cyber war, it’s cyber terrorism and I’m afraid it’s just the beginning of the game … I’m afraid it will be the end of the world as we know it,” Kaspersky told reporters at a cyber security conference in Tel Aviv.

“I’m scared, believe me,” he said.

News of the Flame virus surfaced last week. Researchers said technical evidence suggests it was built for the same nation or nations that commissioned the Stuxnet worm that attacked Iran’s nuclear programme in 2010.

In recent months U.S. officials have become more open about the work of the United States and Israel on Stuxnet, which targeted Iran’s Natanz nuclear enrichment facility.

Read moreKaspersky At Cyber Security Conference: ‘It’s Not Cyber War, It’s Cyber Terrorism And I’m Afraid It’s Just The Beginning Of The Game … I’m Afraid It Will Be The End Of The World As We Know It’

Kaspersky Lab: Flame And Stuxnet Virus Share Common Origin

Related info:

Flame Virus Developed By U.S. Government

Kaspersky At Cyber Security Conference: ‘It’s Not Cyber War, It’s Cyber Terrorism And I’m Afraid It’s Just The Beginning Of The Game … I’m Afraid It Will Be The End Of The World As We Know It’

Obama Ordered The Stuxnet Attack On Iran’s Nuclear Facilities – And Yes: This Is An Act Of War!

President Obama Ordered Stuxnet Attacks On Iran Nuclear Facilities

US And Israel Created Stuxnet, Lost Control Of It

Flame Super-Virus Threatening To Cripple Entire Nations Has ‘Hallmarks Of The NSA’


Diving Into Flame, Researchers Find A Link To Stuxnet (threatpost, June 11, 2012):

Researchers digging through the code of the recently discovered Flame worm say they have come across a wealth of evidence that suggests Flame and the now-famous Stuxnet worm share a common origin.

Researchers from Kaspersky Lab say that a critical module that the Flame worm used to spread is identical to a module used by Stuxnet.a, an early variant of the Stuxnet worm that began circulating in 2009, more than a year before a later variant of the worm was discovered by antivirus researchers at the Belarussian firm VirusBlokAda. The claims are the most direct, to date, that link the Flame malware, which attacked Iranian oil facilities, with Stuxnet, which is believed to have targeted Iran’s uranium-enrichment facility at Natanz. If true, they suggest a widespread and multi-year campaign of offensive cyber attacks against multiple targets within that country.

According to the Kaspersky researchers, early versions of Stuxnet were, in fact, created out of components that were part of what they refer to as the “Flame platform”. But they believe development of the two malicious programs diverged after 2009, suggesting that two different development teams may have been working independently for a single entity to create malware with specific objectives, according to Kaspersky researchers, writing on the company’s blog, Securelist.

Read moreKaspersky Lab: Flame And Stuxnet Virus Share Common Origin

Obama Ordered The Stuxnet Attack On Iran’s Nuclear Facilities – And Yes: This Is An Act Of War!

See also:

US To Classify Major Cyber-Attacks As Acts Of War


Obama Ordered The “Code Stux” (ZeroHedge, May 31, 2012):

When Iran’s nuclear facilities were publicly crippled in 2011 by what then was considered a revolutionary computer virus which destroys physical equipment, many immediately assumed the virus originated in Israel for obvious reasons. They were wrong. In what can be described as the first presidentially-mandated and condoned act of cyberwarfare, one circumventing the War Powers Act of course, the NYT informs us that the order to physically impair Iranian sovereignty came from none other than the Nobel Peace prize winning president: Barack Obama.

From the NYT:

From his first months in office, President Obama secretly ordered increasingly sophisticated attacks on the computer systems that run Iran’s main nuclear enrichment facilities, significantly expanding America’s first sustained use of cyberweapons, according to participants in the program.

Mr. Obama decided to accelerate the attacks – begun in the Bush administration and code-named Olympic Games – even after an element of the program accidentally became public in the summer of 2010 because of a programming error that allowed it to escape Iran’s Natanz plant and sent it around the world on the Internet. Computer security experts who began studying the worm, which had been developed by the United States and Israel, gave it a name: Stuxnet.

At a tense meeting in the White House Situation Room within days of the worm’s “escape,” Mr. Obama, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and the director of the Central Intelligence Agency at the time, Leon E. Panetta, considered whether America’s most ambitious attempt to slow the progress of Iran’s nuclear efforts had been fatally compromised.

“Should we shut this thing down?” Mr. Obama asked, according to members of the president’s national security team who were in the room.

Told it was unclear how much the Iranians knew about the code, and offered evidence that it was still causing havoc, Mr. Obama decided that the cyberattacks should proceed. In the following weeks, the Natanz plant was hit by a newer version of the computer worm, and then another after that. The last of that series of attacks, a few weeks after Stuxnet was detected around the world, temporarily took out nearly 1,000 of the 5,000 centrifuges Iran had spinning at the time to purify uranium.

This account of the American and Israeli effort to undermine the Iranian nuclear program is based on interviews over the past 18 months with current and former American, European and Israeli officials involved in the program, as well as a range of outside experts. None would allow their names to be used because the effort remains highly classified, and parts of it continue to this day.

For those confused – yes: this is an act of war. A New Normal war.

It appears to be the first time the United States has repeatedly used cyberweapons to cripple another country’s infrastructure, achieving, with computer code, what until then could be accomplished only by bombing a country or sending in agents to plant explosives. The code itself is 50 times as big as the typical computer worm, Carey Nachenberg, a vice president of Symantec, one of the many groups that have dissected the code, said at a symposium at Stanford University in April. Those forensic investigations into the inner workings of the code, while picking apart how it worked, came to no conclusions about who was responsible.

And still America continues to wage war, subverting the constitution, without any Congressional approval, and without even telling the population what is really happening. Because it is “for its own good.

A similar process is now under way to figure out the origins of another cyberweapon called Flame that was recently discovered to have attacked the computers of Iranian officials, sweeping up information from those machines. But the computer code appears to be at least five years old, and American officials say that it was not part of Olympic Games. They have declined to say whether the United States was responsible for the Flame attack.

The “New Normal Gulf of Tonkin“:

Read moreObama Ordered The Stuxnet Attack On Iran’s Nuclear Facilities – And Yes: This Is An Act Of War!

President Obama Ordered Stuxnet Attacks On Iran Nuclear Facilities

Don’t miss (Flashback)!!!:

US To Classify Major Cyber-Attacks As Acts Of War:

The Wall Street Journal, citing three officials who said they had seen the document, reported Tuesday that the strategy would classify major cyber-attacks as acts of war, paving the way for possible military retaliation.

The newspaper said that the strategy was intended in part as a warning to foes that may try to sabotage the US electricity grid, subways or pipelines.

“If you shut down our power grid, maybe we will put a missile down one of your smokestacks,” it quoted a military official as saying.


Obama Order Sped Up Wave of Cyberattacks Against Iran (New York Times, May 1, 2012):

WASHINGTON — From his first months in office, President Obama secretly ordered increasingly sophisticated attacks on the computer systems that run Iran’s main nuclear enrichment facilities, significantly expanding America’s first sustained use of cyberweapons, according to participants in the program.

Mr. Obama decided to accelerate the attacks — begun in the Bush administration and code-named Olympic Games — even after an element of the program accidentally became public in the summer of 2010 because of a programming error that allowed it to escape Iran’s Natanz plant and sent it around the world on the Internet. Computer security experts who began studying the worm, which had been developed by the United States and Israel, gave it a name: Stuxnet.

Read morePresident Obama Ordered Stuxnet Attacks On Iran Nuclear Facilities

US And Israel Created Stuxnet, Lost Control Of It

Confirmed: US and Israel created Stuxnet, lost control of it (Ars Technica, June 1, 2012):

In 2011, the US government rolled out its “International Strategy for Cyberspace,” which reminded us that “interconnected networks link nations more closely, so an attack on one nation’s networks may have impact far beyond its borders.” An in-depth report today from the New York Times confirms the truth of that statement as it finally lays bare the history and development of the Stuxnet virus—and how it accidentally escaped from the Iranian nuclear facility that was its target.

The article is adapted from journalist David Sanger’s forthcoming book, Confront and Conceal: Obama’s Secret Wars and Surprising Use of American Power, and it confirms that both the US and Israeli governments developed and deployed Stuxnet. The goal of the worm was to break Iranian nuclear centrifuge equipment by issuing specific commands to the industrial control hardware responsible for their spin rate. By doing so, both governments hoped to set back the Iranian research program—and the US hoped to keep Israel from launching a pre-emptive military attack.

Read moreUS And Israel Created Stuxnet, Lost Control Of It

Iran Claims To Have Beaten ‘Flame’ Computer Virus

Related info:

Flame Super-Virus Threatening To Cripple Entire Nations Has ‘Hallmarks Of The NSA’


Iran claims to have beaten ‘Flame’ computer virus (Telegraph, May 30, 2012):

Iran claims it has defeated a powerful computer virus that has boasted unprecedented data-snatching capabilities and could eavesdrop on computer users, a senior official said.

Ali Hakim Javadi, Iran’s deputy Minister of Communications and Information Technology, told the official IRNA news agency that Iranian experts have already produced an antivirus capable of identifying and removing “Flame” from computers.

Read moreIran Claims To Have Beaten ‘Flame’ Computer Virus

Flame Super-Virus Threatening To Cripple Entire Nations Has ‘Hallmarks Of The NSA’

Was Flame super-virus created in the US? Cyber weapon threatening to cripple entire nations has ‘hallmarks of the NSA’ (Daily Mail, May 31, 2012):

  • Cyber experts: Spyware too sophisticated to have come from anywhere else

The Flame computer virus which is threatening to bring countries to a standstill is too sophisticated to have been created anywhere other than the U.S., it was claimed today.

As the United Nations prepares to issue its ‘most serious warning’ to guard against the superbug, cyber experts said it carried all the markings of a U.S. espionage operation.

Specifically, they have pointed the finger at the highly secretive National Security Agency.

Read moreFlame Super-Virus Threatening To Cripple Entire Nations Has ‘Hallmarks Of The NSA’

Debka: Whoever Hacked The Drone, Hacked The CIA

Flashback:

US To Classify Major Cyber-Attacks As Acts Of War:

The Wall Street Journal, citing three officials who said they had seen the document, reported Tuesday that the strategy would classify major cyber-attacks as acts of war, paving the way for possible military retaliation.

“If you shut down our power grid, maybe we will put a missile down one of your smokestacks,” it quoted a military official as saying.

DebkaFile is the media arm of Mossad. DebkaFile predicted in 2000 that terrorists would attack the World Trade Center and we all know why its prediction has been proven to be accurate.



Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) logo in lobby of the CIA Headquarters in Langley, Virginia (AFP Photo)

Debka: Whoever hacked the drone, hacked the CIA (RT, Dec. 17, 2011):

New reports investigating Iran’s interception of a top-secret drone craft belonging to the CIA allege that the hijacking of the stealth airship could have roots not just overseas but in Washington as well.

Ongoing reports from RT have revealed that Iranian intelligence officer claimed in recent days that the recovery of America’s RQ-170 Sentinel stealth drone on December 4 was not due to an equipment malfunction, as US authorities say happened with another craft last days later, but rather the handiwork of Iranian engineers.

As RT reported yesterday, overseas officials speaking on condition of anonymity say that they were able to crack the computers of the drone to hijack the craft and lead it to a safe landing after it caught the drone creeping over from a mission in Afghanistan. Now military sources speaking to Israel-based news outlet Debka insist that Iranian officials made their way into the drone commander centers at CIA headquarters outside of Washington in Langley, Virginia. Debka has close connections with the Israel intelligence community and in the past has been known for correctly reporting on issues of importance to the American intelligence community before US outlets.

Read moreDebka: Whoever Hacked The Drone, Hacked The CIA

NSA Allies With Internet Carriers To Thwart Cyber Attacks Against Defense Firms

Sure!

See also:

Every 6 Hours The NSA Collects As Much Data As Is Stored In The Entire Library of Congress.


NSA allies with Internet carriers to thwart cyber attacks against defense firms (Washington Post, June 16, 2011):

The National Security Agency is working with Internet service providers to deploy a new generation of tools to scan e-mail and other digital traffic with the goal of thwarting cyberattacks against defense firms by foreign adversaries, senior defense and industry officials say.

The novel program, which began last month on a voluntary, trial basis, relies on sophisticated NSA data sets to identify malicious programs slipped into the vast stream of Internet data flowing to the nation’s largest defense firms. Such attacks, including one last month against Bethesda-based Lockheed Martin, are nearly constant as rival nations and terrorist groups seek access to U.S. military secrets.

Read moreNSA Allies With Internet Carriers To Thwart Cyber Attacks Against Defense Firms

US To Classify Major Cyber-Attacks As Acts Of War

See also:

US: House Passes Authority for Worldwide War (ACLU)

Rep. Ron Paul: ‘The Fate Of The American Republic Is Now Sealed’


Pentagon: All options on table in cyber-attack (AFP, May 31, 2011):

The Pentagon said Tuesday that it would consider all options if the United States were hit by a cyber-attack as it develops the first military guidelines for the age of Internet warfare.

President Barack Obama’s administration has been formalizing rules on cyberspace amid growing concern about the reach of hackers. Major defense contractor Lockheed Martin said it repelled a major cyber-assault a week ago.

The White House on May 16 unveiled an international strategy on cyber-security which said the United States “will respond to hostile acts in cyberspace as we would to any other threat to our country.”

“We reserve the right to use all necessary means — diplomatic, informational, military, and economic — as appropriate and consistent with applicable international law, in order to defend our nation, our allies, our partners and our interests,” the strategy said.

Pentagon spokesman Colonel Dave Lapan said Tuesday that the White House policy did not rule out a military response to a cyber-attack.

“A response to a cyber incident or attack on the US would not necessarily be a cyber response,” Lapan told reporters. “All appropriate options would be on the table if we were attacked, be it cyber.”

Lapan said that the Pentagon was drawing up an accompanying cyber defense strategy which would be ready in two to three weeks.

The Wall Street Journal, citing three officials who said they had seen the document, reported Tuesday that the strategy would classify major cyber-attacks as acts of war, paving the way for possible military retaliation.

Read moreUS To Classify Major Cyber-Attacks As Acts Of War

Cyber War Rule Of Engagement Drawn Up

The world needs to draw up new accords on online warfare to deal with the growing dangers of attacks in cyberspace, David Cameron and fellow international leaders will be told on Friday.


Hillary Clinton will join David Cameron and Angela Merkel at the Munich Security Conference Photo: EPA

Proposals for adapting the Geneva and Hague conventions to provide “rules of engagement” for “cyber war” will be delivered to the Munich Security Conference by American and Russian experts at the influential EastWest Institute, a New York-based think-tank.

World leaders attending the annual Munich gathering include Mr Cameron, Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, and Angela Merkel, the German chancellor.

The EastWest Institute will argue that the new rules will be needed to protect civilian facilities such as hospitals and schools from being hit in future online conflicts.

The team will tell the security conference that discriminating between military and civilian targets and identifying attackers presents major new challenges in the internet era.

Read moreCyber War Rule Of Engagement Drawn Up

WikiLeaks Fights to Stay Online After US Hosting Company Withdraws Domain Name

Everydns.net says attack against leaks site endangered other customers’ service – effectively pushing site off the web


WikiLeaks was removed from its wikileaks.org address. Photograph: Joe Raedle/Getty Images

The US was today accused of opening up a dramatic new front against WikiLeaks, effectively “killing” its web address just days after Amazon pulled the site from its servers following political pressure.

The whistleblowers’ website went offline for the third time in a week this morning, in the biggest threat to its online presence yet.

Joe Lieberman, chairman of the Senate’s committee on homeland security, earlier this week called for any organisation helping sustain WikiLeaks to “immediately terminate” its relationship with them.

On Friday morning, WikiLeaks and the cache of secret diplomatic documents that have proved to be a scourge for governments around the world were only accessible through a string of digits known as a DNS address. The site later re-emerged with a Swiss domain, WikiLeaks.ch.

Julian Assange this morning said the development is an example of the “privatisation of state censorship” in the US and is a “serious problem.”

“These attacks will not stop our mission, but should be setting off alarm bells about the rule of law in the United States,” he warned.

The California-based internet hosting provider that dropped WikiLeaks at 3am GMT on Friday (10PM EST Thursday), Everydns, says it did so to prevent its other 500,000 customers of being affected by the intense cyber attacks targeted at WikiLeaks.

The site this morning said it had “move[d] to Switzerland”, announcing a new domain name – wikileaks.ch, with the Swiss suffix. However, the new address still only points to an IP address, suggesting WikiLeaks has been unable to quickly find a new hosting provider.

Read moreWikiLeaks Fights to Stay Online After US Hosting Company Withdraws Domain Name

Stuxnet ‘Cyber Superweapon’ Wreaks Havoc in China, Infects Millions of Computers

See also:

Anti-Iran computer bug had powerful backers

Has the West declared cyber war on Iran?


An antivirus expert said the virus has infected over 6 million computer accounts

an-antivirus-expert-said-the-stuxnet-virus-has-infected-over-6-million-computer-accounts
The Stuxnet computer worm has wreaked havoc in China, infecting millions of computers around the country, state media have reported.

A computer virus dubbed the world’s “first cyber superweapon” by experts and which may have been designed to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities has found a new target — China.

The Stuxnet computer worm has wreaked havoc in China, infecting millions of computers around the country, state media reported this week.

Stuxnet is feared by experts around the globe as it can break into computers that control machinery at the heart of industry, allowing an attacker to assume control of critical systems like pumps, motors, alarms and valves.

It could, technically, make factory boilers explode, destroy gas pipelines or even cause a nuclear plant to malfunction.

The virus targets control systems made by German industrial giant Siemens commonly used to manage water supplies, oil rigs, power plants and other industrial facilities.

“This malware is specially designed to sabotage plants and damage industrial systems, instead of stealing personal data,” an engineer surnamed Wang at antivirus service provider Rising International Software told the Global Times.

“Once Stuxnet successfully penetrates factory computers in China, those industries may collapse, which would damage China’s national security,” he added.

Another unnamed expert at Rising International said the attacks had so far infected more than six million individual accounts and nearly 1,000 corporate accounts around the country, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

Read moreStuxnet ‘Cyber Superweapon’ Wreaks Havoc in China, Infects Millions of Computers

Has the West declared cyber war on Iran?

Experts say the computer virus found in a nuclear plant is the work of a foreign power

president-mahmoud-ahmadinejad-visits-one-of-irans-nuclear-plants
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visits one of Iran’s nuclear plants, which have come under attack from the virus

Computers can go wrong, and everyone is used to it. But that’s at home. We assume that the machines controlling the infrastructure that makes everything tick – power stations, chemical works, water purification plants – have rock-solid defences in place to deal with unexplained crashes or virus attacks by malicious strangers.

Now, though, a new kind of online sabotage has reached its zenith with a self-replicating “worm” that started on a single USB drive and has spread rapidly through industrial computer systems around the world.

So sophisticated that many analysts believe it can only be part of a state-sponsored attack, the Stuxnet worm – or “malware” – is the first such programming creation designed with the specific intention of causing real world damage. And if the experts are right, it could herald a new chapter in the history of cyber warfare.

Read moreHas the West declared cyber war on Iran?

Obama Administration Plans Secret Big Brother ‘Perfect Citizen’ Net Surveillance

Change we can believe in:

Dylan Ratigan Show: President Obama ‘Has A Hit List Of American Citizens Like YOU targeted For Assassination’

Obama Internet ‘Kill Switch’ Approved By Senate Committee


big-brother-obama

The US plans to install a Big Brother-style monitoring system on the computer systems of private companies and government agencies to prevent cyber-attacks from abroad.

The program, named Perfect Citizen, will rely on sensors that will be deployed in networks running critical infrastructure such as the electricity grid and nuclear-power plants.

It will be able to detect any attempt by foreign saboteurs to launch a cyber-attack .

But privacy campaigners have reacted furiously, saying that ‘mission creep’ will make it easy for security forces to effectively spy on normal citizens.

Read moreObama Administration Plans Secret Big Brother ‘Perfect Citizen’ Net Surveillance

Obama Internet ‘Kill Switch’ Approved By Senate Committee

white-house-internet-control

WASHINGTON (CBS4) ? The White House is one step closer to having the authority to flip the Internet “kill switch” in case of emergency.

The Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs approved a cybersecurity bill called PCNAA, or Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act on Friday. The bill would give the president the power to call it lights out for the Internet if there is “a cyber attack capable of causing massive damage or loss of life.”

The legislation would force companies such as broadband providers, search engines, or software firms that the government selects to “immediately comply with any emergency measure or action developed” by the Department of Homeland Security. Anyone failing to comply would be fined.

Read moreObama Internet ‘Kill Switch’ Approved By Senate Committee

US Cyber Command chief: ‘Pentagon systems are ‘probed by unauthorized users approximately 250,000 times an hour, over six million times a day’

See also: NATO Warns of Military Strike Against Cyber Attackers (Times)


US Cyber Command chief warns of ‘remote sabotage’

general-keith-alexander

The top US cyberwarrior said Thursday that Pentagon networks are probed over six million times a day and expressed concern about a rise in “remote sabotage” attacks on computer systems.

General Keith Alexander, head of the newly created US Cyber Command, also said developing a real-time picture of threats to US military networks and the rules to fight back would be among his priorities.

Alexander, who also heads the National Security Agency, the super secret US surveillance agency, said Pentagon systems are “probed by unauthorized users approximately 250,000 times an hour, over six million times a day.”

In his first public remarks since assuming command of Cyber Command two weeks ago, Alexander said the US military “depends on its networks for command and control, communications, intelligence, operations and logistics.”

“We at the Department of Defense have more than seven million machines to protect linked-in 15,000 networks,” he said in a speech to cybersecurity experts and reporters at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

The role of US Cyber Command is to “deter, detect and defend against emerging threats against our nation in cyberspace,” Alexander said.

“Our nation’s interests are in jeopardy,” he said citing “tremendous vulnerabilities” and threats from a “growing array of foreign actors, terrorists, criminal groups and individual hackers.”

“Cyberspace has become a critical enabler for all elements of national and military power,” Alexander said. “Our data must be protected.”

Read moreUS Cyber Command chief: ‘Pentagon systems are ‘probed by unauthorized users approximately 250,000 times an hour, over six million times a day’

NATO Warns of Military Strike Against Cyber Attackers

And such an attack can be much more easily staged than a real terrorist attack.

Listen also to the buzzwords.


nato

NATO is considering the use of military force against enemies who launch cyber attacks on its member states.

The move follows a series of Russian-linked hacking against NATO members and warnings from intelligence services of the growing threat from China.

A team of NATO experts led by Madeleine Albright, the former US secretary of state, has warned that the next attack on a NATO country “may well come down a fibre-optic cable”.

A report by Albright’s group said that a cyber attack on the critical infrastructure of a NATO country could equate to an armed attack, justifying retaliation.

“A large-scale attack on NATO’s command and control systems or energy grids could possibly lead to collective defence measures under article 5,” the experts said.

Article 5 is the cornerstone of the 1949 NATO charter, laying down that “an armed attack” against one or more NATO countries “shall be considered an attack against them all”.

It was the clause in the charter that was invoked following the September 11 attacks to justify the removal of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

NATO is now considering how severe the attack would have to be to justify retaliation, what military force could be used and what targets would be attacked.

Read moreNATO Warns of Military Strike Against Cyber Attackers