IT! From Industrial Ingredients to Combat Equipment
IT! From Industrial Ingredients to Combat Equipment
  • Chun Go-eun
  • 승인 2009.08.12 01:55
  • 댓글 0
이 기사를 공유합니다

Poster by The Anti Terrorism Accreditation Board

So the development of computing hardware, software, operating systems, network services, and information communication all have contributed to add sufficiency and convenience in our lives, yet the development of IT cannot be called the greatest invention of God.  This best friend of ours can also be friends with zombie PCs, and in a worst case scenario, can be manipulated by an invisible hacker to freeze the banking systems of any country in the world. After all, a personal computer next door can be the crouching tiger who can attack your territory anonymously.

IT is no longer a sweet ingredient to cook e-Commerce.  As much as the World Wide Web is now considered part of many people’s lives, it is also the home of invisible attackers.  Operating systems continuously update, and so will the attackers.  The recent 7.7 DDoS attack could only be a teaser version of what is yet to come.  We have had some classic moments in cyber terrorism history.

McAfee, the biggest computer security company in the States, once claimed in its crime report that the cold war between the US and the Soviet Union was actually replaced by a new version of cyber Cold War.

In April 2007, Estonia in Europe experienced the events depicted in the movie Die Hard 4.0.  All computer networks were hacked and within a two month period, the government was under attack. The Foreign Policy, a magazine on foreign diplomacy, pointed out that the news of the year readers missed in 2007 would be the beginning of the cyber Cold War.

The Estonians learnt their lesson the hard way, allegedly at the hands of Russia.  Estonia suspected that Russia was behind it, pointing out that the attack was made right after a sculpture of deceased Russian soldiers stationed in the capital city, Tallinn, was moved by the Estonian government.

The Baltic country has also been devastated by a hacking attack in the same year. Internet networks of government organizations, media, and financial companies malfunctioned for three weeks, with no choice but to bow to the DDoS attacks which paralyzed the networks by inputting a level of traffic that is too much for servers to cope with.

But a Kremlin spokesmen denied there was any truth in Estonia's claims. After the Estonia-Russia conflict, similar cyber attacks followed. In August 2007, the Prime Minister's office and three ministries in Germany had to investigate cyber attackers. Germany found that some spy programs had been installed to transmit German information to Lanzhou, China every day.

The German government blamed China, saying China desperately needed information on Prime Minister Angela Merkel's announcements to be unpacked during her visit to China. The Chinese authorities rebuked the claim. Two months before the German allegation, the Pentagon was attacked by cyber spies. Some computer systems and e-mails of assistants to the Defense Minister were the targets. The Defense Minister, exceptionally, came out and admitted that the attacks had been very successful. The Ministry also cast a suspicious eye at China. But tit-for-tat attacks are still going on, surrounding the conflicts among the super powers.

Companies and governmental organizations who ignore security will continuously be torn to death - digitally.  An expert on NATO said that some countries have no ability to trace back hackers and to install firewalls against the attacks.  South Korea is no exception. According to the National Information and Security department, or NIS, the number of hacking attempts against Korean government networks amounts to 100 million cases a day. Strong IT infrastructure of Korea, are you all heading to the defense industry


댓글삭제
삭제한 댓글은 다시 복구할 수 없습니다.
그래도 삭제하시겠습니까?
댓글 0
댓글쓰기
계정을 선택하시면 로그인·계정인증을 통해
댓글을 남기실 수 있습니다.

  • ABOUT
  • CONTACT US
  • SIGN UP MEMBERSHIP
  • RSS
  • 2-D 678, National Assembly-daero, 36-gil, Yeongdeungpo-gu, Seoul, Korea (Postal code: 07257)
  • URL: www.koreaittimes.com | Editorial Div: 82-2-578- 0434 / 82-10-2442-9446 | North America Dept: 070-7008-0005 | Email: info@koreaittimes.com
  • Publisher and Editor in Chief: Monica Younsoo Chung | Chief Editorial Writer: Hyoung Joong Kim | Editor: Yeon Jin Jung
  • Juvenile Protection Manager: Choul Woong Yeon
  • Masthead: Korea IT Times. Copyright(C) Korea IT Times, All rights reserved.
ND소프트