financial institutions

Episode 223 with David Sanger: A war reporter for the cyber age

I interview David Sanger in this episode on his new book, The Perfect Weapon – War, Sabotage, and Fear in the Cyber Age. It is an instant history of how the last five years have transformed the cyberwar landscape as dozens of countries follow a path first broken by Stuxnet. And then, to our horror, branch out into new and highly successful ways of waging cyberwar. Mostly against us.  David depicts an Obama administration paralyzed by the Rule of Lawyers and a fear that our opponents would always have one more rung than we did on the escalation ladder. The Trump administration also takes its lumps, sometimes fairly and sometimes not. At center stage in the book is Putin’s uniquely brazen and uniquely impactful use of information warfare, but the North Koreans and the Chinese also play major roles.  It is as close to frontline war reporting as cyber conflict is likely to get.


Continue Reading Episode 223 with David Sanger: A war reporter for the cyber age

Will international law and diplomacy limit cyberwar? Those who believe in international “norms” for cyberwar usually argue that cyberattacks on financial institutions are beyond the pale.

For example, Harold Koh has declared the State Department’s view that cyberwarriors “must distinguish military objectives … from civilian objects, which under international law are generally protected from attack.”

The wave of service disruptions to several major US financial institutions are widely attributed to Iran. These distributed denial of service attacks have grown so serious that US banks have asked the National Security Agency for help.

However, privacy advocates tell us who we should really be worried about: “’The dual mission of the

The White House today announced a pilot program to be led by the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center in which ISPs will share data about botnets with financial institutions. ISPs also announced a set of principles for fighting botnets.

This is a positive announcement. You shouldn’t be engaged in online banking if your