We’re going to war everyone. Online???! – Grasp ’15

We’re going to war everyone. Online???! – Grasp ’15

In the great digital backyards of the internet a profound conflict has been waged for sometime now. At least this is what im told in a cocktail bar in Hyderabad, the midlands of India by a young early 30’s l to do security consultant. True story this – I sit sceptically listening on as he goes to great lengths to paint a picture to me of the almost all of big gun nations around the world funding substantial information probing and dissemination projects, all at the governmental level that seek to fish out the most sensitive of sensitive information. “Flimshaw” I declare, “hogwash” etc, and yes I know hardly the setting for credible and substantive conversation but stay with us on this one………..

Upon returning home and spending hours after curious hour on looking into the matter it becomes patently obvious that this type of conflict isn’t just possible, its downright commonplace amongst nations and factions seeking to get one up on another. And it doesn’t even have to operate at the top brass level either, I was astonished to find. Anyone heard of the name Gary McKinnon? Well, for those who don’t a) check him out for a good read and b) In a nutshell, he’s a middle aged Brit who quietly, and presumably from a dingy armchair managed to eavesdrop and withdraw some of the most sensitive military information straight from desktops based within the pentagon in the U.S. It put the UK and the U.S as allies in a very sticky position. On that note, cue Julian Assange and the ongoing Wikileaks endeavours, cue the Anonymous movement, the infamous collaborative effort to undermine government monopoly’s on information.

Remember Stuxnet? The worm virus with no identifiable author that made its way through a small population of the worlds computers on its way to sabotaging nuclear centrifuges in the middle east. The worlds great tech consultant lecturers almost all unanimously agree that such a virus could have only been coded by a very, very well equipped and government funded source in the U.S. Not that this has ever been substantiated.

So cast a thought as you casually go about your socialising and shopping online that you are using a resource that shares its corridors with information so delicate it balances the security of entire country s on a knife edge. International information wars aren’t just possible they are probable and furthermore they have profound implications. Will secrets ever be secret as long as they are within earshot of an internet connection? After all the internet was a military derived resource and it hasn’t stopped being such since.

Im grabbing my tinfoil hat and off to meet David Icke for a good chin wag.

Give us a shout via Twitter:

For information on how Grasp Support can help support your IT please contact us on the contact page of this website.