Author Archives: markdowe1

Britain, Defence, Government, Military, National Security, NATO

Thousands of cyber-attacks a day target British military…

CYBER WARFARE

The Ministry of Defence in Britain fends off thousands of cyber-attacks every day while its military systems log and report more than a million suspicious incidents on a daily basis.

Increasingly, the UK’s critical infrastructure has become dependent on digital and electronic communication. Cyber-warfare is now such a pressing national security issue that, within the next few years, seems certain to become the UK’s top security priority. This week, the U.S. defence secretary, Ash Carter, warned that a cyber-intrusion in a NATO state’s network would be costly and could trigger a collective response that extends beyond cyberspace. Earlier this year former NATO secretary general Anders Fogh Rasmussen claimed cyber security had become part and parcel of collective security and urged allies to heighten their defences against unconventional warfare.

The head of the British armed forces’ cyber-defence programme, Brigadier Alan Hill, has said that his unit picks up as many as a million suspicious cyber incidents a day on its networks, which he says if left unmanaged could lead to a breach, allowing for a major cyber-attack.

Hill claims that as many as ‘hundreds if not thousands’ of these suspicious occurrences are attempts of serious cyber-attacks on Britain’s Ministry of Defence.

Hill says that he deals with a lot of attacks every day of a varying nature. He insists that what the attackers are after has not changed, but it is the intensity and complexity of the attacks that has. He also lays bare that the threats are evolving almost daily and that it is imperative that defence systems stay ahead of these threats.

Hill heads the Ministry of Defence’s Information Systems and Services which is the highly classified branch of the armed forces, responsible for the state’s cyber defence capabilities.

Despite British Prime Minister David Cameron being expected to heavily cut defence spending, Hill believes that cyber security will continue to be well financed as the nature of such threats demand consistently cutting edge technology and solutions.

He said: ‘More agile procurement is the only way we are going to stay ahead of the game because the tech is changing so fast. We are very sophisticated, but there is no complacency allowed… Traditionally, we defined what we wanted and then over 10 years we had it built. That is great for tanks and ships and aircraft but it’s no good in IT.’

He said he expected ‘continued investment at scale’ in the next defence security review, despite possible cuts elsewhere.

A large part of why the Ministry of Defence is a target for cyber-attacks is because the UK has several stakes within multiple international organisations, and because of its global influence.

Not all cyber-attacks will be categorised as cyber-espionage but the UK and the Ministry of Defence will certainly be a target for such high-end attacks. The UK is a high-profile NATO member and has military deployments and secondments in various conflict hot spots around the world. Lots of things make the UK a desirable espionage target and some of them make the Ministry of Defence a target too.

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European Union, Government, National Security, NATO, Politics, Russia, United States

The Pentagon says Putin is ‘Playing with fire’ over nuclear threats…

NUCLEAR THREATS

The Russian President, Vladimir Putin, addresses his military.

The Russian President, Vladimir Putin, addresses his military.

A senior Pentagon official has warned that Russia is ‘playing with fire’ when it suggested that it could use nuclear weapons to settle international disputes, and accused Moscow and Vladimir Putin of trying to intimidate NATO through such threats.

‘Anyone who thinks they can control escalation through the use of nuclear weapons is literally playing with fire,’ U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defence Robert Work told a House Armed Services subcommittee. ‘Escalation is escalation, and nuclear use would be the ultimate escalation.’

While Moscow has not issued any direct nuclear threats, Kremlin officials have made several references to their nuclear arsenal and announced the construction of 40 new nuclear-capable intercontinental ballistic missiles, a move that Washington has denounced as ‘sabre-rattling.’

Leaked documents from a meeting between U.S. and Russian officials revealed that Russian officials discussed a ‘spectrum of responses from nuclear to non-military’ if NATO went ahead with its plans to enhance its military presence in the Baltic States.

Russia has also threatened several Baltic nations that they would be considered potential nuclear targets if they joined NATO’s missile defence program. In March, the Russian ambassador to Denmark warned that ‘Danish warships would be targets for Russia’s nuclear weapons,’ if the country joined the military alliance.

The Baltic States have seen a growing number of incursions and flyovers from Russian bombers and ships. Russian planes were intercepted over the Baltic Sea 10 times in the last week alone.

Mr Putin, in a March documentary on the annexation of Crimea, said he was prepared to place Russia’s nuclear forces on alert.

Moscow’s recent military overtures were also condemned by the US: ‘Senior Russian officials continue to make irresponsible statements regarding its nuclear forces, and we assess that they are doing it to intimidate our allies and us,’ Mr Work said. ‘These have failed. If anything, they have really strengthened the NATO alliance solidarity.’

The statement from Russia comes shortly after NATO announced a major escalation of its own military presence in Eastern Europe, which would see thousands of vehicles and troops deployed across Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Bulgaria, Romania and Poland.

 

 

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France, Government, Intelligence, National Security, Society, Terrorism, United States

Intelligence services in France gain new laws to eavesdrop…

FRANCE

The National Assembly in France has passed a new law allowing intelligence services to more freely eavesdrop.

The National Assembly in France has passed a new law allowing intelligence services to more freely eavesdrop.

The French parliament has passed a law which will provide state intelligence services with more freedom to eavesdrop. The controversial decree aims to target suspected terrorists.

The law, which was voted on by a simple show of hands from deputies in France’s National Assembly waivers the need for judicial warrants to use an array of spying devices including cameras, phone taps and hidden microphones.

Under the new legislation, French security officials will be able to place clandestine devices in suspects’ homes and beacons on their cars without prior authorisation from a judge.

Communication and Internet firms will also be forced to allow intelligence services to install electronic boxes to record metadata from all Internet users in France. The controversial law has been met with protests from privacy advocates and concern about US-style massive data sweeps. The United States passed a similar law in the form of the US Patriot Act following the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001.

France’s ruling socialist government rushed through the bill earlier this year, shortly after the Islamist militant attacks in Paris, in which 17 people were killed over three days.

Despite the vote in France, the law won’t take effect, however, until a court rules on whether it abides by France’s constitution.

The news of the decree came as France reacted with outrage to revelations from transparency lobby group WikiLeaks that the US National Security Agency had eavesdropped on France’s three most recent presidents – Francois Hollande, Nicolas Sarkozy and Jacques Chirac.

Speaking on French television channel TF1, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange urged France’s leading politicians to launch a ‘parliamentary inquiry’ into the foreign surveillance activity. The anti-secrecy campaigner also said that other important revelations were in the pipeline: ‘I think from a policy perspective, what is to come is much more significant than what we have published so far,’ Assange said.

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