Cyber Espionage Unleashed: A Study on the Stuxnet Incident

The Stuxnet Case

The case related to Stuxnet relates to a software virus initialized by the US and Israel against the Nuclear program of Iran. Stuxnet event is significant since it has taken the present day fighting into another level. Particularly, Stuxnet has eliminated the flaws in IT security and has given the nation and its internet to manage the blow on atomic offices in Iran along with its oil trade offices. On the flipside, Dragonfly malware infected high number of computers used by business entities across the US and Europe as they attempted to obtain information on control systems. The attack occurred over a prolonged time and leveraged on infection of malware based on methods that were easy to detect and thwart (Langill, 2014). The malware has extended impact on the live process control operations that is likely to continue over the coming years.

Impact of NZE’s Sale on Cyber Weapons

   NZE’s sale has expanded the global market and made it profitable, which means that it has led to increased vulnerabilities in relation to security systems against potential threats. For instance, the US government, the biggest buyer of NZE’s continue to experience software vulnerability from private malware vendors. As such, the sale of NZE’s has affected the globally interconnected society, especially in the sale of cyber weapons (Ibor, 2017). The proliferation of exploits along with NZE’s raise significant concerns associated with the relationship between society and technology. Equally, the case heightens the question on the unaccountable use of cyber-attack capabilities. While nuclear security rests on international treaties and bilateral agreements, the approaches remain inapplicable to cyberspace since it is difficult to measure the relative strength of state and effects of cyber technology (Langill, 2014). The process would require participants to consent to intrusive access to state networks for inspection. However, this approach would be unfathomable for one nation to allow another to have unfettered access to its networks. Meanwhile, it is impossible to count cyber weapons like nuclear weapons because of the reluctance to tip off potential adversaries on their capabilities and the issue of intelligence, where agencies like NSA use the internet for surveillance.

The Threat of Electromagnetic Pulse Attacks

   The use of Electromagnetic Pulse has potential threats to nations despite the significant progress in the state of art of the attacks. Businesses and nations that depend on electric power along with everything that it enables remain at risk of EMPs (Ibor, 2017). Characteristically, an EMP attacks move through the air like radio waves with electronics acting as antennas that receive waves. The EMP attacks overwhelm electronics with up to 50K volts by burning them out. Comparatively, the traditional effects of malicious cyber-attacks could lead to computer slow down and cause error in the display of messages. Unlike EMP that affects electronics, malware affects individual computer, such as hijacking browser to redirect sites and send spam through the inbox (Ibor, 2017). The costs of an EMP generator that can lo time press EM-M ranges from $95.50 to 115.30 while anti-alarm EMP generator ranges from $150 to $183.

References

Langill, J. (2014). Defending against the dragonfly cyber security attacks. White Paper Written for Belden, 3, 1-32.

Ibor, A. (2017). Zero day exploits and national readiness for cyber-warfare. Nigerian Journal of Technology, 36(4), 1174 – 1183.