Monday, April 29, 2013

The NSA Has Been Planning Cyber Attacks Since The 1990s

When America Became a Cyberwarrior -- Jeffrey T. Richelson and Malcolm Byrne, Foreign Policy

A secret document shows the NSA has been planning attacks since the Clinton years.

At a time when Chinese malware is targeting America's computer infrastructure and U.S.-Israeli worms (e.g., Stuxnet) have reportedly attacked Iranian centrifuges, a recently declassified item from the National Security Agency (NSA) offers a little history on how at least one part of the U.S. government foresaw its role in the growing field of "Information Warfare."

This short item from a classified NSA publication reveals that as far back as 1997 the super-secret agency was tasked with finding ways not just to listen in on our enemies (the NSA's usual stock-in-trade), but actually to attack hostile computer networks. The document proclaimed that "the future of warfare is warfare in cyberspace," and it sketched out how tomorrow's "Information Warriors" would think, act, and fight on the new digital battlefield.

Read more ....

My Comment: Someone was on the ball when they did this analysis for the NSA 20 years ago.

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