The United States is Under Cyber Warfare

By using the term ill prepared, I aim to convey that the United States is not equipped with enough protection to prevent every possible instance of the threat of cyberwarfare from occurring. I propose we are not where our nation should be in terms of dealing with all actual occurrences of the threat of cyberwarfare, were it to be fully realized. This can be carried over into our response capability to any such attack, which may manifest in many forms. For example, our response against perpetrators and those who aid or comfort

Drawing from authors like Jason Andress who is an academic teacher and a professional security expert, the book Cyber Warfare states that “The U.S. military does not have a definition for cyber warfare today” (53). While this work was published in 2014, it is still a fair assessment into today. According to the CCDCOE, again on their webpage “Cyber Definitions,” cyber warfare as agreed between The United States and Russia is defined as “cyber attacks that are authorized by state actors against cyber infrastructure in conjunction with government campaign.” The two nations also define cyber attacks in the same agreement to mean “an offensive use of a cyber weapon intended to hard designated target.” Finally, the two nations define cyber

The past 15 years the U.S. has been in a C.O.I.N. fight that has brought its own unique challenges and with our attention gathered wholly for this undertaking a new threat immerged virtually unnoticed. Cyber threats have been gaining more traction in the media as of late with several countries linked to these type of attacks, with China leading the forefront.

Private organizations in the United States come under attack weekly if not daily and their cyber defenses must be kept up to par otherwise there will be an extreme loss of information and resources. FBI director James Comey can be quoted as saying “There are two kinds of big companies in the United States. There are those who 've been hacked by the Chinese and those who don 't know they 've been hacked by the Chinese” (Comey). Comey can also be quoted as having said that, “China was seeking to obtain "information that 's useful to them so they don 't have to invent" (Comey). This stolen information can be used against these companies when brokering a trade deal or even Chinese companies could begin manufacturing American goods illegally

Cyber-attacks are being used for espionage, industrial sabotage, or even as a sort of punishment for organizations who are doing business in a way not appreciated by hacker communities. Attacks stopped being random, today’s many hackers know exactly who they want to strike and are patiently waiting for the

All kidding aside, the threats are very real and the need is pressing in ways that I believe the average person doesn’t understand. Cybersecurity will continue to be one of the most critical issues the U.S. faces today in both the civilian and government/military sectors. Regardless of best intentions of those involved, a primarily legislative or regulatory solution will not have the end result desired. The issue is that legislation will fail to improve security and may actually lower it by providing a false sense of security and a possible level of complacency that will not allow for vital levels of security to be developed.

Terrorism has been an ongoing problem in society; however, Cyberterrorism is relatively new. Our country has to adapt to all media threats and how to handle them effectively. A strategic plan needs to be put into action such as finding the enemies goal for the threat, who the enemy is, what their operational techniques are, as well as the resources they have to actually carry out this threat. Terrorist groups now utilize technology to carry out and construct their attacks, which is a possible threat to the United States. This article discussed how military, legal, and political parties confront a threat, and the difficulties associated with cyber- terrorism. For prevention, they analyze domestic and international law and address vulnerabilities in the system, such as setting up a firewall. Also, changing, or rethinking, previous understanding of cyber terrorism by focusing on response and responsibility. Additionally, there are other ways to prevent cyber-terrorism. For example, tradeoffs, tensions, calculations and choices. Every tactic in this article is very descriptive; therefore, I chose three important points to further explain in depth, which are domestic and international law, addressing vulnerabilities, and trade-offs and tensions.

The damage of a full-fledged cyber attack would be devastating, the destruction would be unparalleled to any other tragedy that has occurred America. Since technology is responsible for providing America with vital entities and resources, an unadulterated cyber attack would nearly fail the American economy; this is what is known as critical systems failure. Weapons of mass destruction and cyber attacks present imminent threats of critical systems failure. Although currently Americas’ critical infrastructures are coordinated by controlled systems, majority of these systems are indeed connected to the American cyberspace. This exposes one of America’s most vulnerable spot amidst cyber security. Another major vulnerable spot within the nations IT security would be the geographical physical location for each of Americas primary infrastructures, as well as their productivity. Due to the proximal locations, the major infrastructures could very well be infiltrated by one efficient CNA.

Cyber threats to the energy infrastructure are pervasive. Reports have indicated numerous attempts to enter the nation’s information technology architectures are credible. Is has become common today that threats come from many origins. Some threats are traced from intentional or accidental incidents. Likewise, some threats toward the energy infrastructures come from a disgruntled employee or points of origin traced from foreign nations, seeking opportunities to exploit or cripple the nation’s infrastructures. Additionally, there are threats that attempt to manipulate the power grid profit margins, particularity the electricity sector through deceitful practices by employees. “By changing the reading during this period, they were able

Cyber capabilities are evolving rapidly every day which makes cyber-attacks more prevalent in the present day. In the U.S., the most notable and highly debated international cyber-attacks tie back to China. “For years, the United States has argued that economic espionage by governments is wrong and should stop”. It was not until recently that the United States made this argument heard. In September of 2015, President Obama announced that the U.S. and Chinese governments had reached a deal against cyber espionage. There are many different explanations as to what the causes are that ultimately led the U.S. and China to reach this agreement including, efforts to promote international norm, loss of sensitive information and economic

As it was stated earlier, attacks happen every day, probably too many to count, and the need to secure our systems grows exponentially every day. New systems, devices, programs, etc., are being developed, and the current growth of technology is quite staggering. We also give our information online in order to use several services, such as Facebook and Amazon. This information can be used against us, and used to find other pieces of personal information, such as a social security number. The concern to guard our technology was present before some of us were even born. For example, in 1982, the CIA created the “logic bomb” to disrupt a pipeline in Siberia, which opened up a new tool for hackers (“25 Biggest Cyber Attacks,” 2013). In 2007, the email address belonging to the Secretary of Defense was hacked as part of a spree to exploit weaknesses at the Pentagon (“history of cyber attacks”). Even a high ranking official’s email address wasn’t safe from cyberterrorists. This information alone should scare some people into making cyber-security the top of their worry list. Everyone’s information is always at risk.

Present day events have shown that cyber-attacks are becoming more prevalent and sophisticated on the internet especially against our nation’s Critical Infrastructures (CI). One of them being the U.S. electrical power grid is also a national security risk that is currently vulnerable to cyber threats from malicious actors on the intent of causing a power blackout. The lack of protection on the power grid can result in an operational nightmare that can cause other government entities or specific CI targets that rely on the power grid to be non-operational. The consequence of a blackout would cost billions and can affect millions of people in the United States by delaying essential services needed to keep the country operational, which is essential for the nation’s economy and security. The complexity to understand cyber threats is ever changing due to technological advances and methods being used by computer hackers. The nation’s electricity system consists of generators and regional networks of interconnected transmission lines that are vulnerable to a cyber-attack. However, with increased reliance to develop a smart grid to improve system operability such as supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) to monitor load balances remotely using internet protocols comes more risk for intruders. This paper will identify the risks associated with the electric grid and discuss the proposed new policy approaches that will help the electric industry which have been

All the service connections, transformers, transmission infrastructure, substations, generation plants, and everything required in managing the generation and distribution of electrical power is known as the electrical “Grid.” The term “smart grid” has been used to describe a broad range of technologies, design concepts and operating practices that collectively paint an exciting picture of what our electric power infrastructure might look like in ten or twenty years. It is a new approach that significantly increases the efficiency of the entire electrical delivery system. Not only does increase reliability, but will also reduce energy in the delivery process and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. A

On daily basis many faults occur on the power grid and steps are to be taken to eliminate/remove this faults as quick as possible. If the fault persists for long it could result in a havoc and loss of huge amount of money, which is unacceptable.

Everyone depends on electricity everywhere and all the time; from homes to businesses to transportation, electricity is part of everyday life. The importance of protecting our power utility plants should be implied, but the lack of innovation has caused our electric utilities to become far more vulnerable to cyberattack than in the past. DTL Power grids have become more digital, which allows real-time visibility into power outages, lets customers manage electricity consumption from their smartphones, and deploys sophisticated tools for energy management. All of this means that utilities are more and more exposed, since offering these features over the internet requires connectivity between