A new front opens up in Georgia: Cyberspace

It would appear that the conflict between Georgia and Russia is not confined to the ‘real’ world. There are reports that another front has opened up: Cyberspace.

It would appear that a significant Distributed Denial of Service attack has been visited upon various Georgian Government sites and other Georgian internet servers.  A variety of Government sites have been targeted, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Defense, and the country’s president, Mikhail Saakashvili, have been blocked completely, or traffic to and from those sites’ servers have been redirected to servers actually located in Russia and Turkey.

The speculation is that infamous Russian Business Network (RBN)is behind these attacks. The RBN is a notorious malware and criminal hosting network, albeit there actual involvement is yet to be proven.

There is a trend here. Going back to April 2007, we witnessed a DDoS on Estonia that took out parts of the internet infrastructure for some days.  The attacks coincided with a dispute between Estonia and Russian nationalists about the relocation of WWII era monuments.

I am sure that as part of any countries preparations for War now, include plans and preparations as to how they can protect and defend their internet infrastructure.

August 11, 2008 | Filed Under Events, Security 

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