Page 80 - The Fourth Industrial Revolution

Cyber warfare

Cyber warfare presents one of the most serious threats of our time.

Cyberspace is becoming as much a theatre of engagement as land, sea and
air was in the past. I can safely postulate that, while any future conflict
between reasonably advanced actors may or may not play out in the physical
world, it will most likely include a cyber-dimension simply because no

modern opponent would resist the temptation to disrupt, confuse or destroy
their enemy’s sensors, communications and decision-making capability.

This will not only lower the threshold of war but will also blur the
distinction between war and peace, because any networks or connected
devices, from military systems to civilian infrastructure such as energy

sources, electricity grids, health or traffic controls, or water supplies, can
be hacked and attacked. The concept of the adversary is also affected as a
result. Contrary to the past, you may not be certain of who is attacking you –
and even whether you have been attacked at all. Defence, military and
national security strategists focused on a limited number of traditionally

hostile states, now they must consider a near-infinite and indistinct universe
of hackers, terrorists, activists, criminals, and other possible foes. Cyber
warfare can take many different forms – from criminal acts and espionage to

destructive attacks such as Stuxnet – that remain largely underestimated and
misunderstood because they are so new and difficult to counter.

Since 2008, there have been many instances of cyber attacks directed at both
specific countries and companies, yet discussions about this new era of
warfare are still in their infancy and the gap between those who understand
the highly technical issues of cyber warfare and those who are developing

cyber policy widens by the day. Whether a set of shared norms will evolve
for cyber warfare, analogous to those developed for nuclear, biological and
chemical weapons, remains an open question. We lack even a taxonomy to
agree on what amounts to an attack and the appropriate response, with what

and by whom. Part of the equation to manage this scenario is to define what
data travels across borders. This is an indication of how far there is to go
on effectively controlling cross-border cyber based transactions without
inhibiting the positive outputs from a more interconnected world.

Autonomous warfare

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