Germany reveals secret techie soldier unit, new cyberweapons

Main building of the University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We have ways of making you pwned

By John Leyden • Get more from this author  8th June 2012 11:29 GMT

CyCon 2012 Germany has confirmed that its military maintains an operational cyberwarfare unit with offensive capabilities.

The admission, which appeared in parliamentary documents published on Tuesday, gave no details of the size of the unit much less any operations that it might have run. However documents delivered to the German federal defence committee did reveal that the unit has been operating for six years since 2006, a year before the cyber-attack on Estonia and four years before the discovery of the infamous Stuxnet worm.

http://ds.serving-sys.com/BurstingRes/Site-27237/Type-2/e53ce8c1-9790-4f5e-b89e-03b2539b45a7.swf“The initial capacity to operate in hostile networks has been achieved,” the papers explain, adding that the Computer Network Operations Unit had carried out “simulations” of attacks in a “closed laboratory environment”, German press agency DPA reports.

The unit reports to the joint forces strategic intelligence command. Legislators reportedly expressed surprise at the existence of the unit and questioned whether military commanders had the legal authority to launch attacks on foreign networks.

Prof Dr Wolff Heintschel von Heinegg, a professor of law at European University Viadrina Frankfurt in Germany, told El Reg that the armed forces of many nations are probably building up an offensive cyber capability. The only difference is that Germany and (also recently) the Obama administration is the US are publicly talking about it.

“The German MoD see a potential in having an offensive cyber-op capability as well as an ability to defend critical infrastructures”, most notably military systems, Dr Heintschel von Heinegg explained.

Cyber warfare

Photo: Illustrative photo: Reuters and Marc Israel Sellem

Cyber Warfare is fast becoming a dominant element in every developed country’s military arsenal.

By JPOST EDITORIAL

06/07/2012 23:27

Judging from the slew of news over the past week or so, the field of cyber warfare is fast becoming a dominant element in every developed country’s military arsenal.

In a span of just a few days there has been a flurry of news items related to cyber warfare: the anti-virus firm Kaspersky discovered that Iran’s nuclear program was struck again, this time by Flame, which effectively turns every computer it infects into a spy; The New York Timesreported that the US and Israel were behind the Stuxnet worm, which also attacked Iran’s nuclear program; NATO held its Fourth International Conference on Cyber Conflict; and Israel hosted its own conference on cyber warfare at Tel Aviv University.

Indeed, there is good reason for the rising interest – and deployment – of cyber warfare. After all, there are many appealing aspects to cyber warfare.

Instead of wreaking mass destruction and snuffing out human life, countries can instead attack virtual targets in cyberspace. An aggressor state does not need to expose its own troops to the dangers of conventional or unconventional warfare, thus avoiding casualties and the difficulty Western societies have coping with these casualties. And since cyber weapons can be deployed anonymously from a distance, the aggressor often does not risk political fallout let alone absorbing a retaliatory attack.

Indeed, cyber warfare seems so bloodless and “clean” that there hardly appear to be any real ethical dilemmas with which to grapple.

Just War Theory, based on Judeo-Christian moral principles and Western moral philosophy, is concerned with limiting human casualties and physical damage.

When warfare is waged using a piece of code against some intangible objects, without directly causing casualties or physical damage, the anthropocentric principles of Just War Theory hardly seem to apply.

Nevertheless, it would be a mistake to claim that cyber warfare can be conducted without a consideration of its moral limits. For instance, if it knocks out electricity and the refrigeration necessary to protect supplies, even a modest cyber attack could lead to starvation and the suffering of thousands of innocent.

While the world braces for e-threats, India moves slow

Image via Wikipedia

6 Feb, 2012, 10.58AM IST, Rajat Pandit,TNN

MUNICH: After the first four “real” battlefields of land, air, sea and now increasingly space, India needs to get very serious about the virtual front as well. The country should begin planning a full-fledged military cyber command, instead of the current piecemeal and disjointed steps to bolster cyber-security, grappling as it already is with incessant online espionage and other attacks from China, Pakistan and others.

This was the clear takeaway from the deliberations on cyber-security and cyber-warfare in the high-profile Munich Security Conference on Sunday, even though India hardly figured in the discussions.

Experts said the emergence of “cyber-weapons” like the Stuxnet software ‘worm’ that was used to sabotage Iran’s nuclear programme over a year ago, had changed the entire security ballgame, almost on par with the use of nuclear bombs for the first time in 1945.

Twitter users are being tricked into joining in cyber attacks on U.S. government – and could be jailed

• Links turn any PC into an unwitting part of attack
• Part of ‘hacktivist’ group Anonymous‘s cyber attacks
• Retaliation for U.S. strike at file-sharing site

Last updated at 3:17 PM on 20th January 2012

Links being forwarded via Twitter actually make people’s PCs part of Anonymous’s ‘denial of service’ attacks against U.S. government sites and anti-piracy organisations

Hacker group Anonymous have become a cult hit on Twitter, with 249,000 followers – but security experts Sophos warn that fans, are being tricked into taking part in its attacks.

Links being forwarded via Twitter actually make people’s PCs part of Anonymous’s ‘denial of service’ attacks against U.S. government sites and anti-piracy organisations.

The links are being forwarded as part of Anonymous’s recent ‘Operation Megaupload’ – a retaliation for the U.S. government ‘taking down’ a file-sharing site.

They look like ordinary web links, but launch cyber attacks from whatever PC you access them on.

People who click the links unwittingly become part of Anonymous’s attacks – and hit any website that the ‘hacktivist’ group chooses.

It’s a change of tactics for Anonymous – and security experts warn that claiming you clicked on a link by accident may not be a defense.

The attacks, a ‘denial of service’ attack, rely on thousands of PCs sending information to sites at once to crash them.

Turkish hackers Warn Of Cyber War

by Lee J Published January 8th, 2012

Recently the main media has picked up a story about some Turkish hackers who have been hacking the french.

In one of the latest attacks by a group know as AYYILDIZ who has over 12,000 total defacement’s on h-zone has hacked and defaced a Turkish website with one clear message, they are ready for cyber war.

The defacement which has the below message and video attached can be currently seen on the website or on h-zone mirrors

We are Turkey’s Cyber Army.

For the sake of our country , we will continue fighting against the enemies in virtual world as we do in real world under all heavy circumstances such as winter,cold and snow..

We are never tired and we will never give up !We always support each other and we are always together in good times and bad times.We will declare Cyber War against all the nations having negative ideas about Turkey and our religion Islam.If you insist on these ideas ,get ready for cyber war !We aren’t afraid of anybody and we will give our answer back where necessary.

AYYILDIZ TEAM