Cyberwar: What happens when a nation-state cyber attack kills? - by Danny Palmer

The increasing sophistication and power of state-backed cyber attacks has led some experts to fear that, sooner or later, by design or by accident, one of these incidents will result in somebody getting killed.

It might sound far-fetched, but a former head of the UK's intelligence agency has already warned about the physical threat posed by cyber attacks and the potential damage they could do.

"Nation-states are getting more sophisticated and they're getting more brazen. They're getting less worried about being caught and being named -- and of course that's a feature of geopolitics," said Robert Hannigan, who served as director general of GCHQ from 2014 to 2017.

"The problem is the risk of miscalculation is huge," he said, speaking at a security conference in London last month. "If you start to tamper with industrial control systems, if you start to tamper with health systems and networks, it feels like it's only a matter of time before somebody gets hurt and somebody is ultimately killed."

Read more at: Cyberwar: What happens when a nation-state cyber attack kills? | ZDNet

NSA Spying on EU: Report: Evidence of 2011 US cyberattack on EU defense giant EADS in Germany

"Bild am Sonntag" said on today Sunday July 12 that it inspected a "confidential letter" provided by Germany's foreign intelligence services - the BND - to the domestic intelligence agency - the Verfassungsschutz - outlining a "suspected" attack on European arms manufacturer European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company (EADS) from American soil.

"From a foreign intelligence service, the BND received information about a suspected data tap at EADS Germany," the letter is reported to have said.

The German news outlet claimed that it was the first shred of evidence of a 2011 cyberattack on the French-German manufacturer, headquartered in Munich, since the onset of collaboration between the US National Security Agency (NSA) and the BND.

"Bild am Sonntag" reported that on November 2, 2011, hackers planted a spy program on the computers of EADS, during which 5,116 "connections" were said to have been found between the company's computers and the US-based "aggressors."

Germany's Protection of the Constitution committee informed EADS - now known as the Airbus Group - that their networks may have been compromised by the apparent attack, which had been initially traced to a server in Los Angeles.

Read more: Report: Evidence of 2011 US cyberattack on defense giant EADS in Germany | News | DW.COM | 12.07.2015

Internet - Cyber crime: Massive cyberattack hits Internet users - by Doug Gross

Internet users around the globe are facing slowed-down service, thanks to what's being called the biggest cyber attack in history.

The prolonged denial-of-service assault is targeting The Spamhaus Project, a European spam-fighting group that has gone after CyberBunker, a data-storage company that offers to host any content "except child porn and anything related to terrorism."

The organization has been in a long-running feud with CyberBunker and claims spammers use it as a host from which to spray junk mail across the Web.

Internet security firm CloudFlare said Spamhaus contacted it last week, saying it had been hit with an attack big enough to knock its site offline.

Security experts say the attack uses more sophisticated techniques than most DDoS (distributed denial of service) attacks and targets the Web's infrastructure, which has led to other sites performing slowly.

Read more: Massive cyberattack hits Internet users - CNN.com

Britain: Cyber-attack could knock out British military: lawmakers

The British military's dependence on information technology means it could be "fatally compromised" by a cyber-attack but the government seems unprepared for such an event, lawmakers warned Wednesday.

Parliament's defence committee heard evidence that cyber-attacks could disrupt military communication and information systems, radars and satellites, and leave combat units such as airplanes or ships dysfunctional.

But in a new report, the MPs expressed concern that the government did not have a back-up plan in the case of a failure of technology, instead focusing on averting such attacks in the first place.

"The evidence we received leaves us concerned that with the armed forces now so dependent on information and communications technology, should such systems suffer a sustained cyber-attack, their ability to operate could be fatally compromised," the report said.

"Given the inevitable inadequacy of the measures available to protect against a constantly changing and evolving threat... it is not enough for the armed forces to do their best to prevent an effective attack.

Read more: EUROPE - Cyber-attack could knock out British military: lawmakers