Strategic trends in the global cyber conflict
Cyber Security: A Peer-Reviewed Journal, Dec 1, 2018
The paper reviews the main strategic trends in cyber policy and security in recent years, pointin... more The paper reviews the main strategic trends in cyber policy and security in recent years, pointing out the emergence of a new ‘cyber escalation cycle’: while states are investing significant resources to improve their offensive cyber capabilities, these capabilities are subsequently being stolen, publicised and used by hostile countries to launch devastating cyberattacks. This has led governments to pursue legislation to control incoming technology, changing the technological relations between countries. Given the development of enhanced cyber capabilities and the effectiveness of the attacks, we believe that leakage followed by immediate use of the leaked offensive cyber weapons against rival countries will only increase, making this issue even more contentious.
Uploads
Papers by Gil Baram
increasingly meaningful role in everyday life in a variety of fields,
including industry, medicine, the economy, and security. Because
they are computerized, these systems are exposed to coding errors,
which may lead to incorrect decision making and the execution of
unwanted actions. In addition, they are vulnerable to cyberattacks
that may harm or completely suspend their activity. This article
examines the risks posed to autonomous systems as a component
of the arms race among the powers and discusses policy steps to
contend with these threats at the national level.
victims’ strategies during cyber conflict: in numerous cases, victim states choose to publicly reveal the fact that they had been attacked. These counterintuitive findings are important empirically, but even more so theoretically. They motivate an investigation into the decision to forsake covertness. What does actually motivate states to move
into the international arena and publicly expose a cyber attack?
The goal of this paper is to understand why and under which geopolitical circumstances countries choose to give up the advantages of anonymity. Whether they wish to Name and Shame opponents for ignoring international norms or whether they try to avoid
public humiliation, victims of cyber attacks occasionally reveal the fact that they
had been attacked. There is tension between such motivations and the will to protect
intelligence sources and the incentives to prevent escalation if an attack is revealed, even more so if the attacker is exposed. Indeed, we find that sunk costs, counterescalation risks and the need to signal resolve—while critical in motivating victims to keep cyber attacks secret—may not suffice under such specific circumstances. By focusing on the victim’s side, we draw inspiration from data on real-world cyber attacks in order to place cyber operations in the larger context of secrecy and covert actions in the international arena. In so doing, the aim is to advance the use of empirical data for understanding the dynamics of cyber conflict and the decision-making process of states operating in this increasingly complex domain.