Re How France's TV5 was almost destroyed by 'Russian hackers'

["Dave Farber" <dave () farber net>]

 ---------- Forwarded message ---------
 From: Herb Lin <herblin () stanford edu>
 Date: Sun, Dec 18, 2016 at 6:57 AM
 Subject: RE: [IP] How France's TV5 was almost destroyed by 'Russian hackers'
 To: dave () farber net <dave () farber net>, ip <ip () listbox com>
 
 A chilling story indeed.  But I think the key paragraph is this one:
 
 It was a race against time - more systems were corrupted with every passing
 minute. Any substantial delay would have led satellite distribution
 channels to cancel their contracts, placing the entire company in
 
 jeopardy.
 
 In other words, it was customers cancelling contracts that was the ultimate
 threat to the company.  This particular story thus indicates the value of
 destructive cyberattacks in prompting or instigating large scale reaction
 that can
 
 amplify by many times the effect of any given attack.
 
 An interesting question arises – did the attackers know in advance that
 their attack would place the very economic survival of the company at
 risk?  Or had they “merely” intended wreak havoc that they expected would
 have only short term
 
 effects?  Was the existential nature of threat to the company just
 fortuitous from their perspective?
 
 If the first (they knew in advance), it seems like an exercise in
 predicting second order effects – this time, second order effects that are
 psychological, legal, and economic in nature, rather than technical.
 That’s a significant expansion
 
 of the space that planners of an attack must account for – and defenders
 too.
 
 herb
 
 =======================================================================
 
 Herb Lin
 
 Senior Research Scholar, Center for International Security and Cooperation
 
 Research Fellow, Hoover Institution
 
 Stanford University
 
 Stanford, CA  94305  USA
 
 herblin () stanford edu
 
 650-497-8600 office || 202-841-0525 cell || 202-540-9878 fax
 
 AIM herblin (any time you see me)
 
 Skype herbert_lin (usually by appointment)
 
 Twitter @HerbLinCyber
 
 #safetypin
 
 -----Original Message-----
 
 From: Dave Farber [mailto:farber () gmail com]
 
 Sent: Saturday, December 17, 2016 5:10 PM
 
 To: ip <ip () listbox com>
 
 Subject: [IP] How France's TV5 was almost destroyed by 'Russian hackers'
 
 http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-37590375
 
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