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Internet Attack Spreads, Disrupting Major Websites

nytimes.com

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Re: Internet Attack Spreads, Disrupting Major Websites

#81

Post by scrollaway »

fowlerpower wrote: post #71
scrollaway wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Boy am I glad you're not in charge of foreign relations, for the sake of nearly every country in the world. "War? Whatever, so be it!". Right? A complaint often surfaces from those that have actually lived through wars: How disconnected people are from war. Your country (I'm assuming) has been at war with various bits of the middle east for over a decade and you are not suffering the consequences. It's all remote for…

Your making a lot of assumptions about me. I am an immigrant from a country that has had suffered very severely from war. The point is not to let these guys do whatever they want. Go into Ukraine, kill UN volunteers in Syria. Let them become emboldened by different types of attacks and tomorrow we will have the type of war your talking about. Handle these problems now that they are small. Edit: I wanted to add that i…

Well, yes, I'm making assumptions and I even highlighted them. Now if you tell me you've seen in person what war does to people and you're calling for round 2 with two superpowers, I don't believe you.

If, on the other hand, you're saying that the Russia situation needs to be solved sooner rather than later, you'll have a hard time finding somebody who disagrees but that shouldn't come at the cost of the entire planet. That's just nihilism.

Re: Internet Attack Spreads, Disrupting Major Websites

#82

Post by rfrank »

Crito wrote: post #64
rfrank wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about say, stealing a map of secret military installations? Can stealing certain pieces of data be considered an act of war?

> Espionage is stealing data. You tell me . Under their classification system, is stealing map data espionage?

Don't know, hence the question. It seems murkier than data vs. infrastructure. The one article I've read so far on the subject doesn't say much [1]. The Cyber Act of War Act of 2016 is apparently working its way through Congress [2].

Does application of the stolen data play a factor? ie considering the OPM breach an act of war if compromised individuals are blackmailed. Would Russia stealing the location data & capabilities of our missile defense system constitute an act of war?

1. http://www.wsj.com/articles/when-does-a-hack-become-an-act-o... 2. https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-bill/5220...

Re: Internet Attack Spreads, Disrupting Major Websites

#83

Post by codedokode »

fowlerpower wrote: post #37

The U.S. has changed the rules of engagment to state that any cyber attack can be met with real military counterattack. If the Russians are behind it, after being emboldened by Ukraine and Syria, the United States has to respond. I'm not saying all out war but I am saying we have to show the Russians that this affects everything we are about. It affects our businesses, our elections, and our way of life. I am saying…

Would not disconnecting a cable from Russia or installing a firewall be a cheaper solution?

Re: Internet Attack Spreads, Disrupting Major Websites

#84

Post by eternalban »

cm2187 wrote: post #33
msane wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hopefully it's not related threats about hacking during the election. Remember that recently Biden openly threatened cyber attack on Russia if they make any attempt to tamper with the election. Which is completely unprecedented, as is the notion that DOD is openly saying Russia was behind DNC and other attacks.

Also what amazed me is that he would casually threaten to strike Russia. It seems that no one considers these attacks as an act of war. But that's what they are.

NATO's new position as of July 2016: http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_78170.htm

    In July 2016, Allies reaffirmed NATO’s defensive 
    mandate and recognised cyberspace as a domain of
    operations in which NATO must defend itself as 
    effectively as it does in the air, on land and at sea.
The technical verbiage used is "domain of operations" and "security domain".

This article says that "massive" cyber attacks can lead to invocation of Article 5: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-cyber-nato-idUSKCN0Z12NE

http://www.navyhistory.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/541-b_...

Re: Internet Attack Spreads, Disrupting Major Websites

#85

Post by mjevans »

drvdevd wrote: post #75
laurentdc wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hm, in my experience the difference between idle and 100% CPU usage on a modern ARM processor (e.g. Allwinner H3) is around 1 Watt. That's more or less what an LCD monitor in standby draws. I wouldn't call that significant (as in, impacting the global energy consumption significantly) even if thousands of devices started the attack at the same time.

Would you call that detectable? Eespecially en masse. Perhaps a smart grid could detect these attacks in some way and dynamically adjust power to compromised devices?

I wouldn't. The signal ratio to noise very likely just isn't there.

Remember, people regularly operate toaster ovens, microwaves, hairdryers, etc on a fluxuating basis, and THOSE tend to consume more like 1200+ Watts for a /single/ device.

Re: Internet Attack Spreads, Disrupting Major Websites

#86

Post by deegles »

traskjd wrote: post #68
gamegod wrote: post #45

Irony alert: > "But technology providers in the United States could suffer blowback. As Dyn fell under recurring attacks on Friday, Mr. York, the chief strategist, said such assaults were the reason so many companies are pushing at least parts of their infrastructure to cloud computing networks, to decentralize their systems and make them harder to attack." Pushing your infrastructure to cloud computing is not decent…

Interestingly, in some ways this is a big selling point of AWS/Azure/Goog. The absolute scale they can handle is way up there. The downside of course, is that whilst their infrastructure can likely handle it, handling the bill associated with 'just scale up your service' could be worse than the attack itself.

That's a good point. If anything, it makes DDOS attacks more effective since you can't easily scale up your bank account :)

Re: Internet Attack Spreads, Disrupting Major Websites

#87

Post by gtirloni »

tunesmith wrote: post #14
leephillips wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trying to fight a war purely with defense is usually a dangerous strategy. The only long-term solution is to find the attackers and take them out.

That's irony, right? I can't even tell anymore.

Microsoft has had an active role in taking down botnets.

https://krebsonsecurity.com/2012/03/microsoft-takes-down-doz...

Re: Internet Attack Spreads, Disrupting Major Websites

#88

Post by Jerry2 »

codedokode wrote: post #83
fowlerpower wrote: post #37

The U.S. has changed the rules of engagment to state that any cyber attack can be met with real military counterattack. If the Russians are behind it, after being emboldened by Ukraine and Syria, the United States has to respond. I'm not saying all out war but I am saying we have to show the Russians that this affects everything we are about. It affects our businesses, our elections, and our way of life. I am saying…

Would not disconnecting a cable from Russia or installing a firewall be a cheaper solution?

Their next move would be disconnecting the US.

http://www.hisutton.com/Yantar.html

What then?

Re: Internet Attack Spreads, Disrupting Major Websites

#89

Post by [deleted] »

traskjd wrote: post #68
gamegod wrote: post #45

Irony alert: > "But technology providers in the United States could suffer blowback. As Dyn fell under recurring attacks on Friday, Mr. York, the chief strategist, said such assaults were the reason so many companies are pushing at least parts of their infrastructure to cloud computing networks, to decentralize their systems and make them harder to attack." Pushing your infrastructure to cloud computing is not decent…

Interestingly, in some ways this is a big selling point of AWS/Azure/Goog. The absolute scale they can handle is way up there. The downside of course, is that whilst their infrastructure can likely handle it, handling the bill associated with 'just scale up your service' could be worse than the attack itself.

[deleted]

Re: Internet Attack Spreads, Disrupting Major Websites

#90

Post by mjevans »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #15

We seem to be needing more concerted action on what is a consumer minimum standard for an internet connected device. Consumer devices have to be more secure because if the low user skill level - and interest. I am always reluctant to say "there should be a law against it" but frankly if we cannot mandate minimum standards of uogradbility and security for devices we will just keep handing over our devices to the first…

Or you need to make it easier for the 'black hole' solution to be pushed further and further back to the sources of the bad traffic.

A remote site shouldn't be able to get you banned from the Internet (by it's self); but it MUST be able to say, "This host is being abusive, restrain them from sending me data". ISPs SHOULD use that information to evaluate if a host from their network might be compromised or otherwise a negative player. ISPs SHOULD also take steps to inform, and link to educational resources, customers which are being bad citizens of the Internet. ISPs SHOULD also be financially motivated (punishments to them) for allowing too many uncivil customers online; this might take the form of instead banning that ISP from the Internet as a whole.

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