Part I explored the expanded threat and risk environment created with the unfettered access to destructive power by the weaponization of cyber tools and the anonymity of the modern cyber combatant. In Part II of this two part article, the authors continue to explore and discuss ever-present cyber threats that raise national security concerns.
New Instruments, Same Tune
“We are currently under attack.” Those were the words of a concerned student at the University of California, Berkley, in an email sent shortly after a malicious program was unleashed on the Internet from a computer located at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The program was a worm that self-propagated and targeted computers running a specific version of an operating system. The worm also utilized multiple attack vectors, including stealth, backdoor access to email systems, and overcoming network ID verification protocols. Because the targeted operating system was used by the country’s leading research institutions, the worm’s victims included UC Berkley, Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, Johns Hopkins, NASA, and the Livermore National Laboratory. The year was 1988.
