UK fears “Cybergeddon”

Terrorists are planning a deadly new attack: this time online – that’s the fear of the UK government, which has announced the creation of a national cyber army to counter web assaults on the country’s infrastructure.

Cybergeddon and Digital Pearl Harbor – these are just two of the nicknames given to the ultimate computer-generated terrorist attack. According to the British government, it’s not that far away.

To counter the perceived threat, the security minister has announced the launch of the futuristically-named “Cyber-Security Operations Centre”. It will bring together the expertise of MI-5, the police, and GCHQ – the communications branch of the UK’s intelligence agency.

Paralyzing “poison”

In the scenario laid out by officials, terrorists would attack the computers that run a country’s critical infrastructure – the electricity grid, oil and gas supplies, water and communications. Experts say the initial effect of such an attack would be crippling.

“What would happen is that the initial impact would freeze services, and that would bring us to our knees,” said Harry Ferguson, a former MI-6 officer.

“You effectively gain a strategic advantage over your enemy because you paralyze movement, you cause civilian disruption, disrupt essential services, inhibit the ability of your enemy to react, you slow your enemy down, which is something you’re always looking to do in modern warfare”.

Where do the hackers come from?

According to the UK’s security minister, the government has already faced cyber attacks from China and Russia, although he denies that any secret information was stolen.

Security services believe Al-Qaeda is also working on hacking into key systems to lift military secrets and launch cyber-terrorist attacks.

According to Ferguson, “With the number of weapon systems which rely on computer, on electronic information, increasing all the time, that type of attack is becoming more and more effective.”

Web security stepped up worldwide

The British government is not alone in its fight against digital terrorism.

The US has also set up a cyber-defense command in the Pentagon, where it says it’s already registering tens of millions of attacks on its systems every day.

Governments all over the world are realizing that the next big threat to their national security could come from the Internet. And it’s not like a nuclear attack, where the location of warheads and who possesses them is known. Cybergeddon could come from anywhere and at any time, and at the moment a key suspect is Russia.

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