World's first Cyber Coldwar soon in a theater near you

Remember the cyberwarfare in Estonia? Remember the Chinese targeted attacks, against the United States, India and Germany? This might have been just the tip of the iceberg.

Today, McAfee released their "VIRTUAL CRIMINOLOGY REPORT" (broken link fixed). The report is based on input from more than a dozen security experts from NATO, the FBI, SOCA, The London School of Economics, and the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism.

According to the report, about 120 countries are developing ways to use the Internet as a weapon to target financial markets, government computer systems and utilities and internet security companies.

China might be at the forefront of the cyberwar. "The Chinese were first to use cyber-attacks for political and military goals," according to James Mulvenon, director of the Center for Intelligence and Research in Washington.

Intelligence agencies already routinely test other states' networks looking for weaknesses and their techniques are growing more sophisticated every year.

According to the report, attacks have progressed from initial curiosity probes to well-funded and well-organized operations for political, military, economic and technical espionage.

It's time to shore up our defenses, both on the enterprise front and the government side. Especially in Belgium, we have a long way ahead of us. Anyway, the report is a MUST READ!!

On a side note, my blog seems to be mentioned in the references. ;-)

UPDATE: China is officially disputing the report.

"China has also been attacked by hackers of some countries, so the Chinese government attaches great importance to and participates in the international law enforcement cooperation in this area," Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said at a briefing Thursday.

Liu refused to reveal which countries were targeting China.