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Nuclear weapons agency breached amid massive cyber onslaught

politico.com

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Re: Nuclear weapons agency breached amid massive cyber onslaught

#81

Post by xyzzyz »

ehnto wrote: post #76
sjg007 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if we have dead man switches.. In a MAD world you would want to launch without human intervention from isolated systems.... I wonder how that would work... maybe it's not possible.

I have always wondered, if I were at the helm of a government asserting MAD capabilities, I would probably just not hold up my end of the bargain. Threatening MAD makes total sense, but once your enemy has assured your own destruction, is there much sense in actually following through? All you are doing is assuring millions of innocent people die for the actions of some generals. All this to say, that it is unthinkab…

Your enemy might have intelligence that will allow them to learn that your MAD is a bluff, in which case they have all incentive to attack immediately.

Re: Nuclear weapons agency breached amid massive cyber onslaught

#83

Post by sushshshsh »

pengaru wrote: post #80
toomuchtodo wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reliable, boring old tech to the rescue.

> Reliable, boring old tech to the rescue. Reliable is not a word that comes to mind when recalling floppy disks of my youth.

Reliable no, but difficult to access via a REST API yes

Re: Nuclear weapons agency breached amid massive cyber onslaught

#84

Post by _-david-_ »

mhh__ wrote: post #59
IndPhysiker wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering the OPM hack under the predecessor provided information on every person with a security clearance, I don't think it is quite fair to blame one as this sadly seems to be par for the course. I'm sure the incoming octogenarian will understand the series of tubes better...

When you have the President firing people (Director of DHS Cybersecurity ring any bells?) for not playing his insane games, does the apple fall far from the tree? If you think the president needs to actually "understand" anything subtle like (even physical) security, you are being deliberately obtuse or naive.

This hack happened prior to the firing.

Re: Nuclear weapons agency breached amid massive cyber onslaught

#85

Post by SCLeo »

emptyparadise wrote: post #46

Oops your launch codes have been encrypted! What Happened to My Nuclear Deterrent? Your abort codes are encrypted and your nuclear arsenal has been placed at DEFCON level 1. Many of your ICBMs, submarines, launch silos, bombers and other facilities are no longer accessible because their communication channels have been encrypted. Maybe you are busy looking for a way to cancel the launch, but do not waste your time. N…

"There we go again"

*opens AES 256 decryption toolkit

Re: Nuclear weapons agency breached amid massive cyber onslaught

#86

Post by IndPhysiker »

mhh__ wrote: post #59
IndPhysiker wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering the OPM hack under the predecessor provided information on every person with a security clearance, I don't think it is quite fair to blame one as this sadly seems to be par for the course. I'm sure the incoming octogenarian will understand the series of tubes better...

When you have the President firing people (Director of DHS Cybersecurity ring any bells?) for not playing his insane games, does the apple fall far from the tree? If you think the president needs to actually "understand" anything subtle like (even physical) security, you are being deliberately obtuse or naive.

It is pretty reasonable to say that managers need to have at least a cursory understanding of the business they are managing. That doesn't mean anyone expects a president to take a direct hand in selection of components for a security infrastructure, but rather have an appreciation that information security is quite serious and put competent managers in place over those decisions. Even a Director level position in any location in government is still rather far removed from the decision process as their purview typically includes HR, budgeting, procurement, regulatory oversight, and somewhere further down the pole is the actual work. That isn't naivete but reality of how this bureaucracy works.

Re: Nuclear weapons agency breached amid massive cyber onslaught

#87

Post by danaur »

Andrex wrote: post #49
gen220 wrote: post #7

Bit of a misleading title by Reuters. They accessed the business networks of the NNSA, the agency responsible for maintaining the nuclear stockpile, but did not access the networks managing the actual nuclear weapons, as the title half-implies. There was no threat of random nuclear weapon exploits, those networks have not been compromised as far as we know.

> They accessed the business networks of the NNSA, the agency responsible for maintaining the nuclear stockpile, but did not access the networks managing the actual nuclear weapons, as the title half-implies. That they know of / are admitting at this time. The damage could really be far worse. It's hard to tell right now I think.

But don't you think that the title still is misleading? You can't just say we don't know and then write a title that it happened

Re: Nuclear weapons agency breached amid massive cyber onslaught

#88

Post by vl »

gen220 wrote: post #7

Bit of a misleading title by Reuters. They accessed the business networks of the NNSA, the agency responsible for maintaining the nuclear stockpile, but did not access the networks managing the actual nuclear weapons, as the title half-implies. There was no threat of random nuclear weapon exploits, those networks have not been compromised as far as we know.

Well, it looks like they started to build up narrative for another military deployment once new president is in power, who cares about specific details?

Re: Nuclear weapons agency breached amid massive cyber onslaught

#89

Post by ronsor »

emptyparadise wrote: post #46

Oops your launch codes have been encrypted! What Happened to My Nuclear Deterrent? Your abort codes are encrypted and your nuclear arsenal has been placed at DEFCON level 1. Many of your ICBMs, submarines, launch silos, bombers and other facilities are no longer accessible because their communication channels have been encrypted. Maybe you are busy looking for a way to cancel the launch, but do not waste your time. N…

I should've never opened that Nuclear_Update.pdf.exe attachment!
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