You are the target
A few years ago, two Chinese air force colonels, Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui, published Unrestricted Warfare (PLA Literature and Arts Publishing House, 1999), a treatise explaining how underdeveloped nations could attack the United States. The tactic? Mount cybercampaigns against the US infrastructure, and American businesses are fair game.
They write: "If the attacking side secretly... launches a sneak attack against its financial markets, then after causing a financial crisis, buries a computer virus and hacker detachment in the opponent's computer system in the advance, while at the same time carrying out a network attack against the enemy so that the civilian electricity network, traffic dispatching network, financial transaction network, telephone communications network, and mass media network are completely paralysed, this will cause the enemy nation to fall into social panic, street riots, and a political crisis."
According to Captain Robert West of the Joint Task Forceâ€"Computer Network Operations, the book has stirred wide debate about whether we are prepared for such an attack. But is it really a threat or just a scare tactic? West argues, "You have to assume that is being discussed over there as an option."
