Security expert rules out cyber warfare

Japan Herald (IANS) Wednesday 19th October, 2011

Cyber war - long considered by many defence experts to be a significant threat - may never happen, a security expert says.

Thomas Rid, expert in war studies, King's College London, argues that cyber warfare has never taken place, nor is it currently doing so and is unlikely in the future.

Rid, who specialises in cyber security and conflict and counterterrorism, said a deadly computer worm Stuxnet which apparently damaged the Iranian nuclear programme spurred speculation that cyber warfare is imminent, reports The Journal of Strategic Studies.

There have also been alleged acts of cyber warfare originating from Russia aimed at Estonia and Georgia, according to a King's College statement.

However, Rid states that to constitute cyber warfare an action must be a potentially lethal, instrumental and political act of force, conducted through software use.

Yet no single cyber attack has ever been classed as such and no act alone has ever constituted an act of war.

'Politically motivated cyber attacks are simply a more sophisticated version of activities that have always occurred within warfare: sabotage, espionage and subversion,' the expert concludes.