STAY UNITED TO  CURB CYBERTERRORISM AT THE WORKPLACE

     With the rapid evolvement of Internet, everyone have to be prepared to keep themselves and their workplace secure. If we do not join hands together, our national security would be at stake.

     In an organization, every single employee should be educate in regards of cyberterrorism. Basically, they should be given a first hand on how they should handle any suspicious activity they encounter during their day to day task involving computer
networks. They should be able to alert the relevant team or authorities when there is a data leakage or unauthorised users accessing their computer systems.

      Sensitive information or data should be handled delicately as the risk or the threat of the impact is higher. Apart from that, employees must be educated as to how they are able to maintain or keep their work secure from cyberterrorism. 

     When the right prevention are kept in place, employees know what is the next course of action to mitigate the risk of being the target of cyber attackers.
     

     

https://www.princeton.edu/~ppns/Docs/State%20Security/Cyberterrorism%20-%20sum%20of%20all%20fears.pdf

CYBERTERRORISM: THE SUM OF ALL FEARS?

     In this research conducted by United States Institute of Peace, USA and University of Haifa, Israel, stressed that cyberterrorism is an attractive option for modern terrorists. The threat from cyberterrorism is very alarming. There are many threats mentioned in this research. Most of it are related to 9/11 attacks.  

     What can cyberterrorists do?

• disrupt the financial institutions
• attack air traffic control systems
• alter the formulas of medication 
• remotely-change the pressure in the gas lines 

     In summary, the authors mentioned that terrorists groups are making wide use of the Internet and they are moving towards cyberterrorism.
     

STEGANOGRAPHY TOOLS

     What is steganography? Steganography is the practice of concealing a file, image or video within another file, message, image or video. In layman term, steganography is the science of hiding information. 
     
     Basically, what happens in stenography is when a secret message is sent to other party, normal person would not be able to know what is the real message. Any individual can hide information in any kind of file.  

     Steganography tools enables a user to embed hidden data inside a carrier file, such as an image or video, and later extract the data. Nowadays, steganography tools are being widely used in the cyberterrorism. Steganography is supporting global terrorism.

     In recent events happening around us, many terrorist groups are sharing their information through embedding it into image files without being able to be traced by anyone apart from their sources. They are sharing these images over the email. 

http://www.rmmagazine.com/2012/10/05/understanding-cyberterrorism/

UNDERSTANDING CYBERTERRORISM

     After going thru the article, the author had stressed several matters pertaining cyberterrorism. First of all, she highlighted the definition of cyberterrorism would keep on changing due to the evolving technological age. Furthermore, it is complicated to define something so intangible.

     The author also mentioned about the damages that cyberterrorism can do to anyone. There are few examples such as a power plant can be taken offline, a company’s finances could be wrecked and a region’s ability to communicate wiped out. 

IMPACT - INTERNATIONAL MULTILATERAL PARTNERSHIP AGAINST CYBER THREATS


     The International Multilateral Partnership Against Cyber Threats (IMPACT) is headquartered in Cyberjaya. It serves as the key partner of the United Nations' (UN) specialised agency for ICTs, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU).

Objective of IMPACT

• serves as politically neutral global platform that brings together governments of the world, industry and academia to enhance the global community's capabilities in dealing with cyber threats. 

COUNTERING CYBERTERRORISM

     There are many ways that we can combat cyberterrorism. Before any plans are being implemented, everyone should work as a team and stay united in order to prevent the cyberterrorism to enter into our grid. As we all know the effects of cyberterrorism is pretty much high and there should be a solution or guideline to ambush these hackers.

     Many large scale multinational companies are very much familiar with the term business continuity plan or better known as BCP. In preparations of combating cyberterrorism, business continuity has proven to be crucial in every aspect of an organization. For an example, if there is cyber attack in one of the unit or department, the business continuity plan ensures that the day-to-day operations will run smoothly at another site without any disruption. Business continuity plan can also be said as a backup for an organization.

     Policies and procedures in an organization or government should be strict in order to prevent this unlawful act. Everyone needs to be guided or trained on how they should activate or raise an enquiry when there is a system issue which might be related to cyberterrorism. Procedures and policies need to be updated on a timely manner so that it is asynchronous with the latest technologies.

     Personal behavior or attitude also plays an active part in preventing cyberterrorism. Each one of use has to help each other to counteract the threats caused by this negative destruction. If you are working for an important organization or the government, you should be responsible and be prepared for everything.

     In summary, there are many ways we can prevent cyberterrorism from damaging our nation and save the innocent lives.

EFFECTS OF CYBERTERRORISM

1. Political instability

2. Damages of infrastructures

3. Disrupt of communications systems

4. Downturn of financial markets

5. Incite terror to the civilians

http://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/how-real-is-the-threat-of-cyberterrorism-1.2608935

DOES CYBERTERRORISM RELATE TO TERRORIST ORGANIZATION?

     There are instances whereby cyberterrorism is related to terrorist organization. I came across an article on the website which highlighted the findings of former FBI agent Andre McGregor on cyberterrorism.

     McGregor defined cyberterrorism is that the attack has to be claimed by a terrorist organization. In align to that, the cyber attack must include hazardous acts against property, life and safety. Apart from that, the government policy can also be influenced to this unethical act.

     He also mentioned that currently the capable hackers are mostly from Iran. They have very sophisticated and evolving technology to develop their own destructive malware and software and engaging in spear phishing.

     Currently, US, UK, Canada, New Zealand, Australia and Israel are capable of carrying out a complex and coordinated cyber attack. 

     That does not mean, we in Malaysia, are not able to defeat these attack. With proper solutions and enforcements, we can also mitigate these attacks in our nation.

https://faculty.ist.psu.edu/bagby/Fall05/346F05T4/intro.html


APPEALING REASONS AS TO WHY PEOPLE ARE INVOLVED IN CYBERTERRORISM


     In this article, the author has mentioned clearly that there are several appealing reasons as to why an individual becomes a cyber terrorists. This is an addition to the previous post I've published. 

• Remote attacks 

Terrorists are able to conduct their mission or activities from any part of the world without being traced.

•  Damage scope

Ability to enhance massive destruction without the fear of losing their own lives. Damages occur more than what we can imagine.

• Greater fear factor

Cyberterrorism is able to infuse fear into the lives of their enemies as it comes without any warning. There is uncertainty in our daily lives as the impact of cyberterrorism is wide.

• Minimal resources required

Cyberterrorism just require an individual connected to the internet to create major damages to anywhere they are instructed to. Furthermore, the funds required are minimal to run the wreckage and disruption.
           

WHY CYBERTERRORISM IS HAPPENING?

     Cyberterrorism used to be anonymous to all of us before. However, nowadays every single incident that happens around us is somehow related to cyber crimes especially cyberterrorism. As we all know cyber terrorism poses a vast number of threats to individuals, organizations and governments.

     From my point of view, cyberterrorism takes place due to several reasons. Personal gain is one of the important factors as to why cyberterrorism takes place.  These people send out viruses to other users just to annoy them or to ruin their daily lives.  Furthermore, they can also disable certain life or death related matters of the affected party.

     Lately, cyberterrorism is being related to religion.  Cyber terrorists are attacking the cyber space by relating names of their god or other religious subjects. By doing so, they are gaining publicity and these terrorists have many followers as they believe that the religion had asked them to do all this catastrophic events in others life. They are least bothered about how many innocent lives are affected by these issues.

     Cyberterrorism is low cost and it only requires the person to be able to handle the computer. It doesn’t require special machinery such as the ones used in the wars. For an example, bombs or machine guns. These cyber terrorists are able to interrupt the infrastructure controls of an organization or government. Eventually, it will cost more damage in regards to the time and money to the impacted parties as cyberterrorism is disastrous.

     At times, these hackers just want to create fear among the cyber space users. Hence they would try to spread rumors about things that never happened. The rumor panicked by a number of people. This is one of the major ethical issues faced by many of us these days. In the long term, psychological intervention is established whereby those terrorists are satisfied with their acts of making other people suffer tremendously emotionally.

     In align to all the factors mentioned above, bringing down the reputation or tarnishing an organization, individual or government is also one of the reasons why cyberterrorism takes place. When there is a major system breakdown due to spread of viruses to the database whereby customers’ bank details can be obtained by the terrorists, customers lose their trust to the organization as a whole. It is not their mistake however due to the accessibility of the terrorists to these personal information, customers may want to hop to another entity which they feel could provide them more assurance.

     These are some of the factors that trigger cyberterrorism. There could be other reasons along with the ones I’ve mentioned but overall these factors seem to have more impact on the current cyberterrorism issues.

http://www.usip.org/sites/default/files/sr119.pdf

CYBERTERRORISM HOW REAL IS THE THREAT?

     In this article, the author stressed on the point that cyber terrorism is becoming an increase in the security. The threat posed by cyber terrorism is tremendous.

     Cyber terrorism is has been used by modern terrorist to cripple the government and the military for their own purposes. Through cyber terrorism, people everywhere are having fear that one day their country would also be the victim of cyber terrorism.

     Cyber terrorism can damage many aspects of the society and the overall nation. This new way of attacking people and their government through the usage of computers and the Internet has been very alarming.

     Why is cyber terrorism has been attractive options to some irresponsible people?
• cheap
• anonymous
• variation of targets are large
• remote access
• affect large number of people

COMPUTER CRIMES ACT 1997

     The internet is a great means of communication for all us to interact with each other. However, lately it has been used as a tool to attack governments by irresponsible people.

     In Malaysia, computer crimes has increased and this includes cyber terrorism as well. Why so? This is because the users do not need high tech weapons or explosives to attack whoever they desire.


     Hence, Computer Crimes Act 1997 was introduced in the aim to provide for offences relating to the misuse of computers. Below are the offences that will be prosecuted in this Act:-
• unauthorized access to computer material
• unauthorized access with intent to commit or facilitate commission of further offence
• unauthorized modification of the contents of any computer
• wrongful communication
• abetments and attempts punishable as offences
• presumption

CYBER CRIMES

     Cyber crime is any illegal activity that involves a computer, its systems, or its applications. It is any intentional act associated in any way with computers where a victim suffered or could have suffered or could have suffered a loss, and a perpetrator made or could have made a gain. In layman term, computer crime or cyber crime is referred to a misdeed involving a computer and the networks.

     There are three major types of cyber crimes which are cyber crimes against persons, property and government. Below are some of the examples of cyber crimes which are happening around us:-

• identity theft
• financial crimes
• cyber terrorism
• hacking, cracking and phishing

WELCOME NOTE

Dear All,

     Welcome to my blog. I’m Shamla Raja, final year student from Multimedia University, Cyberjaya, Malaysia. As part of my Cyberlaw assignment, I will be analysing and discussing on articles and other mediums posted in this blog which are related to Cyber Terrorism.


     Hope you can provide me with your opinion and leave comments whenever you view this blog of mine. Thank you for your precious time.