On the night of Oct. 11, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta stood inside
the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum, housed in a former aircraft
carrier moored at a New York City pier, and let an audience of business
executives in on one of the most important conversations inside the U.S.
government.
He warned of a “cyber Pearl Harbor,” evoking one of the most tragic moments in American history, when Japanese bombers unleashed a devastating surprise attack on a U.S. naval base in Hawaii on Dec. 7, 1941, killing 2,402 Americans and wounding 1,282 more. President Franklin D. Roosevelt called it “a date which will live in infamy” as he asked Congress for a declaration of war.
Sixty years later, another surprise attack killed almost 3,000 people when al-Qaeda terrorists flew two jetliners into New York’s twin towers. Panetta cited the Sept. 11, 2001, strikes, too, warning that the United States is in a “pre-9/11 moment,” with critical computer systems vulnerable to assault.
We all know what an act of war looks like on land or sea, and by evoking two of the most searing attacks in our modern history, Panetta was trying to raise a sense of urgency about the threat in a new domain made of bits and bytes zinging between servers around the world.
But what does an act of war look like in cyberspace?
Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/when-is-a-cyberattack-an-act-of-war/2012/10/26/02226232-1eb8-11e2-9746-908f727990d8_story.html?hpid=z2
He warned of a “cyber Pearl Harbor,” evoking one of the most tragic moments in American history, when Japanese bombers unleashed a devastating surprise attack on a U.S. naval base in Hawaii on Dec. 7, 1941, killing 2,402 Americans and wounding 1,282 more. President Franklin D. Roosevelt called it “a date which will live in infamy” as he asked Congress for a declaration of war.
Sixty years later, another surprise attack killed almost 3,000 people when al-Qaeda terrorists flew two jetliners into New York’s twin towers. Panetta cited the Sept. 11, 2001, strikes, too, warning that the United States is in a “pre-9/11 moment,” with critical computer systems vulnerable to assault.
We all know what an act of war looks like on land or sea, and by evoking two of the most searing attacks in our modern history, Panetta was trying to raise a sense of urgency about the threat in a new domain made of bits and bytes zinging between servers around the world.
But what does an act of war look like in cyberspace?
Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/when-is-a-cyberattack-an-act-of-war/2012/10/26/02226232-1eb8-11e2-9746-908f727990d8_story.html?hpid=z2
No comments:
Post a Comment