Georgia cyberattacks just 'enthusiasts'?

By | August 13, 2008, 9:28am PDT

Summary: Gadi Evron, former head of Israel’s CERT, says the evidence in the attacks on Georgia’s government websites points to “enthusiasts” not the Russian government. “Not all fighting is warfare,” he says. While Georgia is obviously under a DDoS attacks and it is political in nature, it doesn’t so far seem different than any other online after-math [...]

Gadi Evron, former head of Israel’s CERT, says the evidence in the attacks on Georgia’s government websites points to “enthusiasts” not the Russian government. “Not all fighting is warfare,” he says.

While Georgia is obviously under a DDoS attacks and it is political in nature, it doesn’t so far seem different than any other online after-math by fans. Political tensions are always followed by online attacks by sympathizers.

Could this somehow be indirect Russian action? Yes, but considering Russia is past playing nice and uses real bombs, they could have attacked more strategic targets or eliminated the infrastructure kinetically.

Coulda, shoulda… the nature of what’s going on isn’t clear, but until we are certain anything state-sponsored is happening on the Internet it is my official opinion this is not warfare, but just some unaffiliated attacks by Russian hackers and/or some rioting by enthusiastic Russian supporters.

(Via News.com

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Richard Koman

http://government.zdnet.com/?page_id=3731

Biography

Richard Koman

Richard Koman is an attorney admitted to practice in California. As a technology writer since the mid-1980s, Richard Koman has documented the role of computing in the transformation of the graphic arts, the growth of the Web and the birth of the peer-to-peer phenomenon. He worked as a book and web editor for O'Reilly Media throughout the 1990s, editing several influential websites and numerous best-sellers. As a lawyer, as well as a tech writer, he brings a unique perspective to the blog's intersection of law, government and technology.

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