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Obama’s Cyber Coordinator clarifies cyber policy concerns
January 2012
Christopher Painter, the US Department of State’s Cyber Coordinator, sits down for a discussion of the key issues with Defence IQ’s Richard de Silva. Here, Painter addresses the White House’s cyber policy when it comes to international partnering and global network protection, including whether he believes there is a need for new rules of engagement in cyberspace.
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Brazil preparing cyber defence for the World Stage
January 2012
Lt Gen José Carlos Dos Santos, head of the Brazilian Army’s Cybernetic Centre (CDCiber), explains why his nation’s attention has turned so much to the digital space, as Brazil continues to modernise its entire military. Every new platform will need to be integrated with the network, and that means cyber security is a priority – particularly as all eyes will be on Rio’s World Cup and Olympic Games in just a few years time.
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Austria’s role in European and global cyber defence
January 2012
It’s not just the large-scale militaries taking an active approach to cyber defence. Brig Gen Helmut Habermayer is the head of Military Strategy for the Austrian MoD, and outlines the fringe work being advanced by his nation’s armed forces and how this must stand side-by-side with vulnerable infrastructure. Habermayer also discusses resourcing cyber warriors from the ‘black hat’ community and how the new generation is training for cyber defence.
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Trinidad & Tobago’s cyber police force
January 2012
Sergeant Amos Sylvester, head of the Trinidad & Tobago Cyber Crime Unit, explains how his department is now being sent across the world to source information, expertise and advice from other leading cyber defence initiatives. Sylvester’s primary concern is to thwart organised crime efforts to strip financial sector of its assets, because, in his own words, “cyber crime touches everyone in society” and must be controlled.
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Risk of grand-scale cyber disaster “increasing every year”
January 2012
Robert Lentz once headed the National Computer Security Center under the Reagan administration before it was cancelled in the 1980s. Only now is the US government seeking to catch up on combating the growing cyber threat, which includes the very real risk of a large-scale digital-led conflict. Lentz is now the President of FireEye, a company that is making vital progress in the field of private-public network security, and we find out how the architecture of the company provides such a robust platform.
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US Army RCERT Director: Defending the virtual front line
Michael Boyer, Director of RCERT Europe, explains what it takes to lead a team to protect the world’s best equipped army as it is targeted with a huge amount of cyber attacks daily. Boyer provides thoughts on the immediate dangers, why he believes we need a new cyber treaty, and details his recent success stories.
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New Sherriff in Town: Law and order in US CYBERCOM
LCDR Paul A. Walker of the US Navy’s JAGC is the Operations Law Attorney for US CYBERCOM. He spoke with us this year on several key issues, including the difficulties facing the legal system when dealing with the cyber domain, why he believes concerns over attribution have been overblown, and why he thinks existing rules of engagement and conventions of war can be applied without issue to cyberspace.
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When it Rains: Cloud computing and the impact on network security
Dr. Steve Purser, Head of the Technical and Competence Department at ENISA, explores the need for governments and industry to work together to mitigate the cyber risk, and the progress already being made. He also looks at cloud computing in terms of risks and benefits when it comes to security.
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China’s Cyber Capability: misconceptions and opportunities
How advanced is China’s cyber programme? Must today’s cyber warriors learn the Chinese language to be effective? Can NATO ever work with China on network defence? In this frank interview, Bill Hagestad, former LTC with Force Movement Control at the US Marine Corps Reserves, and now one of the most respected outsider authorities on the Chinese information capability provides some straight forward answers to a controversial subject.
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Counter-Terrorism for CNI: UK Cyber Policy Today
How do terrorists fit into the cyber threat? How is the UK addressing the risk to Critical National Infrastructure? Who is ultimately responsible for national cyber defence? Wing Commander Tom Parkhouse
, Cyber policy Staff Officer at the MoD, shares his top-level perspective on these issues exclusively with Defence IQ.
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sKyWIper: A complex malware for targeted attacks
The official CrySys Lab technical paper, released as v1.03 (May 28, 2012), that triggered the frenzy concerning the Flame / sKyWIper discovery. This report offers deep insight into the script of the malware, including similarities and differences from Stuxnet.
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Overview by the US-CCU of the Cyber Campaign against Georgia in August of 2008
December 2011
With both Georgian and Russian speakers in attendance at this year’s event, the US Cyber Consequences Unit has taken the opportunity to release its 2009 analysis of the cyber campaign that disrupted critical Georgian systems during the 2008 dispute. This special report finds that the attacks were the activities of independent actors and not of the Russian government, as once suggested by some analysts. However, it raises serious concerns upon which all nations must take action when it comes to the policing and prevention of potentially dangerous hackers, working from within home boundaries. All views and conclusions expressed herein are those of the US-CCU and not of IQPC.
- Cyber Doctrine: Towards a coherent evolutionary framework for learning resilience
June 2011
Contributor: JP MacIntosh, J Reid and LR Tyler. Institute for Security & Resilience Studies, University College London.
Drawing on work and with input from cybersecurity practitioners, technology specialists, legal experts, policy makers, entrepreneurs and academics, ISRS has identified the major challenges faced by anyone seeking to ensure the security, exploitation and exploration of cyberspace. Whether a sovereign body, corporation or citizen, surviving and thriving will depend upon embracing an ethos of delivery, innovation and growth to ensure that the UK becomes a (or possibly the) trusted hub for global ventures.
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A Suggested Approach to the Protection of Critical Infrastructures
January 2012
Cyber expert Maitland Hyslop presents this informative research proposal on a more robust way of pooling resources and shaping a coherent structure to the authorities responsible for the protection of CNI, recognising particularly that Critical Infrastructures are now often multi-national rather than solely national. Maitland is the author of Springer’s ‘Critical Information Infrastructure: Resilience and Protection’, five other books, and over 50 published articles.
Are We Heading Towards a ‘Digital 9/11’?
October 2011
What was once referred to as a ‘digital Pearl Harbour’ has since given way to the notion of a ‘digital 9/11’, owing not just to the freshness of recent memory, but to an insistence upon accuracy. For it is acknowledged by most involved in the cyber domain that should a large-scale virtual attack take place, it will not be levelled primarily at military systems, but at the more vulnerable, and more vital, civilian networks.” Read why we need a measured analysis of the prospect of a large-scale cyber disaster, and the aspects dividing opinion among leading experts.
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The Cyber Security Industry and You
September 2011
As the recent Chatham House report on the UK’s reliance on – and failings of – the private sector to safeguard our national infrastructure, it is now more pertinent than ever to assess the data security industry and its progressive capabilities. To find out more, Defence IQ went through the looking glass to discover not only the platforms and services of the most influential gardeners of the UK cyber security landscape, but also the real threats, trends and challenges that keep them up at night.