G8 agenda calls for "civilized Internet": monitored, governed, controlled, taxed

Re:G8 agenda calls for "civilized Internet": monitored, gove... by GHFigs on Tuesday May 24, 2011 @07:13AM (#2579402)

The trouble with this kind of thing from the perspective of government is that not everybody who runs important things does it. Those that do may not always do it well, and if they don't, there generally isn't anyone in government with the expertise or responsibility to tell them things like "if you actually cared about security, you wouldn't do that".

The other problem with it is anthropomorphic Stuxnet, which giggles like a schoolgirl when anyone says there's no route to the Internet.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:G8 agenda calls for "civilized Internet": monitored, gove... by dexen on Tuesday May 24, 2011 @11:04AM (#2580083)

They can't make country's networks secure by covering them with an `one-size-fits-all' global firewall either. Once they cover up all existing holes, new ones have to be `punched through' to achieve useful functionality -- opening new attack surfaces. Cat and mouse at best, countless hacks more realistically. Never mind inside jobs -- and also remember the Google hack springboarded from within via vulnerable IE.

Could you explain what does that `anthropomorphic Stuxnet' stand for?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:G8 agenda calls for "civilized Internet": monitored, gove... by GHFigs on Tuesday May 24, 2011 @12:47PM (#2580580)

They can't make country's networks secure by covering them with an `one-size-fits-all' global firewall either.

True, but I don't think that's central to what most governments are seeking to do, if it is as all. Even the US "kill switch bill" was almost entirely about things other than the so-called "kill switch".

Could you explain what does that `anthropomorphic Stuxnet' stand for?

The "anthropomorphic" bit was just me being excessively silly and forgetting that it's not a very common word even among native English speakers. My apologies. Stuxnet does not, in fact, giggle.

As for Stuxnet: As jrockway correctly pointed out you can secure a network against attacks from the Internet by not connecting it to the Internet. But, on the other hand, one of the most notable attacks in recent history, and one that I think that governments have in mind when thinking about cybersecurity, is an attack that targeted (and reached) systems which weren't connected to the Internet.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropomorphism Anthropomorphism is a term coined in the mid 1700s to refer to any attribution of human characteristics (or characteristics assumed to belong only to humans) to non-human animals or non-living things, phenomena, material states and objects or abstract concepts, such as god(s).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuxnet Stuxnet attacked Windows systems using an unprecedented four zero-day attacks (plus the CPLINK vulnerability and a vulnerability used by the Conficker worm) It is initially spread using infected removable drives such as USB flash drives, and then uses other exploits and techniques such as peer-to-peer RPC to infect and update other computers inside private networks that are not directly connected to the Internet.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:G8 agenda calls for "civilized Internet": monitored, gove... by dexen on Tuesday May 24, 2011 @02:21PM (#2580943)

Oh, and here I was assuming the ((giggling)) `anthropomorphic Stuxnet' (the whole phrase) was a parabole for some other malware, spontaneous network effect (like the popular `routing around censorship') or perhaps a hacktivist group. Disappointed a bit now that you explained it, but thanks anyway :-) Somehow I've missed the fact that Stuxnet worked via good ole sneakernet rather than the usual kind of network.

Semi-related, there was that old sci-fi story by Stanisław Lem. A mad scientist was researching two AIs (based on organical matter, IIRC) that somehow communicated with one another in spite of some distance and thorogh screening of all known means of communication. The scientist was puzzled beyond comprehension; story's protagonist notes the scientist himself served as as unnwitting messenger -- as he (affectionaly) touched AI's chassiss, he subconsciously passed data by taping on 'em, probably somehow `programmed' to do so by the other AI. Oh well.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:G8 agenda calls for "civilized Internet": monitored, gove... by seabee on Tuesday May 24, 2011 @12:38PM (#2580537)

To be more precise, there are routes from the internet but not always back to it; not that I expect anthropomorphic Stuxnet to understand, it wasn't programmed with a brain.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:G8 agenda calls for "civilized Internet": monitored, gove... by chopsueyar on Tuesday May 24, 2011 @07:58AM (#2579470)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropomorphism

[ Parent | on HN ]