Cyber war:
UN chief calls for treaty
SWITZERLAND: The world needs a treaty to prevent cyber attacks
becoming an all-out war, the head of the main UN communications and
technology agency warned Saturday.
International Telcommunications Union secretary general Hamadoun
Toure gave his warning at a World Economic Forum debate where experts
said nations must now consider when a cyber attack becomes a declaration
of war.
With attacks on Google from China a major talking point in Davos,
Toure said the risk of a cyber conflict between two nations grows every
year.
He proposed a treaty in which countries would engage not to make the
first cyber strike against another nation.
“A cyber war would be worse than a tsunami — a catastrophe,” the UN
official said, highlighting examples such as attacks on Estonia last
year.
He proposed an international accord, adding: “The framework would
look like a peace treaty before a war.”
Countries should guarantee to protect their citizens and their right
to access to information, promise not to harbour cyber terrorists and
“should commit themselves not to attack another.”
John Negroponte, former director of US intelligence, said
intelligence agencies in the major powers would be the first to “express
reservations” about such an accord. Susan Collins, a US Republican
senator who sits on several Senate military and home affairs committees,
said the prospect of a cyber attack sparking a war is now being
considered in the United States.
“If someone bombed the electric grid in our country and we saw the
bombers coming in it would clearly be an act of war.
“If that same country uses sophisticated computers to knock out our
electricity grid, I definitely think we are getting closer to saying it
is an act of war,” Collins said.
Craig Mundie, chief research and strategy officer for Microsoft, said
“there are at least 10 countries in the world whose internet capability
is sophisticated enough to carry out cyber attacks ... and they can make
it appear to come from anywhere.”
“The Internet is the biggest command and control centre for every bad
guy out there,” he said.
The head of online security company McAfee told another Davos debate
Friday that China, the United States, Russia, Israel and France are
among 20 countries locked in a cyberspace arms race and gearing up for
possible Internet hostilities. Mundie and other experts have said there
is a growing need to police the internet to clampdown on fraud,
espionage and the spread of viruses.
“People don’t understand the scale of criminal activity on the
internet. Whether criminal, individual or nation states, the community
is growing more sophisticated,” the Microsoft executive said.
“We need a kind of World Health Organisation for the Internet,” he
said.
“When there is a pandemic, it organises the quarantine of cases. We
are not allowed to organise the systematic quarantine of machines that
are compromised.”
He also called fo a “driver’s license” for internet users. “If you
want to drive a car you have to have a license to say that you are
capable of driving a car, the car has to pass a test to say it is fit to
drive and you have to have insurance.”
Andre Kudelski, chairman of Kudelski Group, said that a new internet
might have to be created forcing people to have two computers that
cannot connect and pass on viruses.
Davos, Sunday, AFP |