Seeing The Internet As An ‘Information Weapon’

Source: Tom Gjelten, NPR.

The United States and other world powers have agreed to arms control measures in recent years that limit the deployment and use of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons, as well as tanks and other artillery pieces. So why is there no arms control measure that would apply to the use of cyberweapons?

It is not for lack of attention to the issue. The problem is that governments have widely varying ideas of what constitutes a “cyberweapon” — and what a “cyberwar” might look like.

Advanced industrial democracies are likely to see a cyberattack as an assault on the computer infrastructure that underlies power, telecommunications, transportation and financial systems.

But many developing countries see cyberwar in political terms. The Russian government, the leading advocate for a cyber-arms-control agreement, prefers the term “information war” and describes the threat in terms that make cyber conflict sound like a battle of ideas.