Cyberspace a new frontier in international conflicts

Oakland, California: As Georgian troops retreated to defend their capital from Russian attack, the websites of their government, also under fire, retreated to Google.

In an internet first, Georgia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs reopened its site on Google's free Blogger network and gave reporters a Gmail address to reach the National Security Council.

The attacks have deluged the websites of the president, various ministries, and news agencies with bogus traffic. The jam not only shut down those sites but also clogged Georgia's internet access, exposing its reliance on Russian internet pipelines.

Some in the cybersecurity community say this may be nothing more than grass-roots "hactivism," which usually springs up during international confrontations. Others, however, warn that the attack highlights the leverage some countries have gained over adversaries by laying down fibre-optic cables and providing cheap internet services.

"The lesson here for Washington is that any modern conflict will include a cyberwarfare component, simply because it's too inexpensive to be passed up," says Bill Woodcock, research director at Packet Clearing House, a nonprofit internet research institute in San Francisco. "The best [defensive] strategy is always preparedness. We've spent eight years completely ignoring that, while the Chinese and Indian governments have been paying really close attention and investing many tens of billions of dollars."

By one count, 110 nations are saddled with the problem. Former Soviet states in particular are poorly connected and increasingly reliant on Russia, he says. That's in part due to the legacy of the Soviet period. But now it has more to do with Russia's ability to offer superior internet service through its investments in infrastructure. The situation is somewhat analogous to the more-widely-noticed reliance that neighbours have on Russia's energy pipelines.

China and India have been laying even more fibre-optic cable than Russia, allowing them to offer cheap prices and snatch away much of the Asian web traffic that at one time flowed through Palo Alto and Los Angeles, says Woodcock.

Shoring up the cyberdefences of friendly governments could involve laying new fibre to be price-competitive with adversaries, establishing internet exchange points, and building up expert strike teams that can respond rapidly to attacks, cybersecurity experts say.

The Baltic nation of Estonia, which last year weathered significant cyberattacks, has dispatched two computer experts to help Georgia, according to Katrin Pargmae, an Estonian spokeswoman.