Inside America's Hacking Epidemic

In the early days of computing, a hacker was primarily referred to as a computer guru, someone who is extremely technical with a high expertise in computer also known as “Expert Programmers”. Nevertheless, as technology is advancing at a face pace, hacking has adopted a completely different definition. The modern definition is someone who access a computer system primarily to steal or destroy information. Hacking has caused major harm in the realm of technology. Over the years, hackers have become much more lethal in their craft. They manage to break into complex information systems from entities such as banks, government agencies, and private businesses. Furthermore, they often manipulate their victims through social engineering in order to obtain financial benefits. Hackers hold different label such as: black hat hacker and white hat hacker in which all have their own motives.

The US should not retaliate in a cyber-war because it can cause lots of damage to our water supply, cellphone towers, trains, airport landing lights, and even our daily lives. If we were to go to war with Russia or another country that is more experienced in hacking, the results would be terrible. The other country would be able to malfunction our airplane equipment. They could make the plane go out of control, malfunction the landing gear, or take complete control over the plane. They could hack into our banks and take our money which would leave the country in debt. They could damage the stock markets and make any company go down dramatically in business.

America hacking epidemic. Hacking in America is becoming a bigger and bigger problem every day. Hackers/cyber criminals have actually hacked into the Pentagon, State Department, and the White House. They have stolen the personal data of an estimated one half of Americans in attacks on banks and tech companies like yahoo and provided WikiLeaks with the personal emails of democratic party officials, as well as generals and former secretaries of state. Hackers are breaking into illegal and personal information that isn't entitled to them. Being able to get into secret and personal information may not seem as bad as it sounds, but it can get you into serious trouble even just with the little things.

The United States is under attack. To be exact, the nation’s power grid is under attack in the form of cyber warfare. On May 21st, 2013 Congressmen Edward J. Markey and Henry A Waxman published a report that provided the findings from information that they had requested from over 150 utility companies (of which 60% responded). More than a dozen utilities reported “daily, constant, or frequent attempted cyber-attacks” (Markey & Waxman) with one utility reporting that they have about 10,000 attempted attacks per month!

Adam Segal’s “The Hacked World Order” reveals many prevalent issues in today’s technologically centered society. Starting at Year Zero, June 2012 to June 2013, the battle over cyberspace witnessed world-changing cyberattacks. This was accomplished due to the fact that nearly 75% of the world’s population has easy access to a mobile phone, and the Internet connects nearly 40% of the total human population, which is nearly 2.7 billion people. With that being said, cyberattacks are becoming a more realistic form of terror.

Look at your watch; it’s 8:15 now. Within the next 15 minutes 157 major metropolitan areas would have been plunged into darkness. Poison gas clouds will be floating towards Houston. Refineries in Texas will be burning up their oil supplies. Subways in New York would have crashed. Freight trains would have been rendered non functional. Aircrafts will be falling out of the sky. The financial systems would have frozen because of terabytes of data being wiped out. Weather navigations, and communication satellites will be spinning out of their orbits. We will be left defenseless and without any resources; it would be a “Cybergeddon”. In less time than it took you to download Live Free or Die Hard, the hackers could make it real. Recent cyber attacks

The worse attack on the United States computer network took place in 2008. The Deputy of Secretary of Defense, William J. Lynn III, described the event as a “network administrator’s worst fear: a rouge program operating silently, poised to deliver operational plans into the hands of an unknown adversary” (Lynn, 2010). The common thought that comes to mind when we think of an attack on a network infrastructure is that the attack is a complex attack coordinated by some “black hat ” hacker/cracker that had to decipher lines of code and encrypted algorithm to penetrate the United States network infrastructure. However, the most common attack and the most devastating attack to infect the United States network was a simple social engineering attack.

Cyber terrorism is just as its name implies; it is the utilization of the internet for the purpose of causing terror. Today’s cyberterrorist have several methods available for achieving their goals. The first of these is a general term known as “Hacking” which refers to anyone gaining access to a computer or a network of computers to which they are not allowed. There are various forms by which a hacker can gain this access. Hacking is comprised of five key methods utilized for the purpose of gaining that access to a computer or computers whichever may be the case. A terrorist could use hacking methods such as packet sniffing, Tempest, password cracking, or buffer overruns to gain access to unauthorized computers for the purpose of stealing credit card or other financial information. They can also use these tools for the purpose of gaining control of a specific computer or network

Prevalent to the current trend now is the dependency of the society on Information technology and communication systems. Every aspect of human life is one way or the other linked and controlled by information technology tools. The importance of information technology cannot be over emphasized as its unavailability could lead to a form of disaster or the other. Pivotal infrastructures like finance, healthcare, education and security are driven by information technology. However, information technology and its benefits are accompanied by vulnerabilities and risks that can be exploited by people with the necessary technical skills. Individuals like ‘Hackers’ and ‘Cyber Terrorist’ can cause disruption to information systems, commit financial fraud and also attack computers and networks. These attacks and disruptions could result to violence against people and properties. In some cases, death, serious injuries and severe economic loss could occur as a result of these attacks.

The potential threats of dark web to the government are many especially breach of important and private information. There is another group separate from the hackers known as hactivists. Hacktivism can be referred to as the act of breaking or hacking into the computer network or gaining access to unauthorized networks with the intention of promoting information ethics, political ends, free speech and human rights. As websites become more secure hackers are using more sophisticated methods. In the past hacking was done by a group of hackers but recently it is done by individuals. The individuals who perform the act of hacktivism are known as hacktivists (Ortiz-Arroyo, 2013). Hacktivists has similar tools and techniques as hackers, but they do so with the intention of disrupting services, and take the public’s attention to the social or political cause. Hacktivism started in the early 1980s when hacking was done for fun and profit. It was then that hacking was marked as a threat. At first it was in the form of worms, and computer viruses that were used to spread protest messages. An example is the WANK (Worms against Nuclear Killers).

By the year of 2016, investments in online security are expected to reach $86bn (Contu et al, 2012). Although this might seem a large sum of money, it is considered necessary since there is an increase in online risks from all over the world. Professional hackers develop malware on a global scale and on a 24/7 basis. Hackers have five objectives when spreading malware over the Internet: to infect/distribute, to steal, to persist, to control and for intelligence (Morris, 2010).

Imagine if you were an employee of a large credit card corporation such as Visa or MasterCard. You can make up to $90,000 a year but all of a sudden your bank account was $0.00 along with all your coworkers, bosses and the company stock dropped to zero. There would be panic, chaos and disorder due to everyone losing their money. The culprit of such a chaotic situation was a result of a cyber-attack by a hacker. The cyber attacker hacked into the system and caused the databases to transfer all of the money into some bank accounts elsewhere. This is just one example of cyber terrorism and all the damage it is can do to people lives. Businesses corporations are usually not targets of terrorism, but government databases usually are targeted. Cyber terrorist often try to hack into government databases and steal information that would be valuable to America but dangerous in the hands of terrorist. Through cyber-attacks information for nuclear weapons, shut down codes or other government secrets can be gained by a number of terrorist organizations. “ cyber-attacks on our nation private sector and government networks have increased dramatically in the past decade” ( www.fbi.gov) This increase in attacks means that there is a higher chance that terrorist can shut major power grids and leave millions without power or disrupt the stock market to cause mass panic in the

Black hat, grey hay, white hat, all terms to identify different classes or cyber criminals, all tied together under the label of hacker. Whether it is for the greater good or for pure evil, cyber security seems to be breached every day as the media puts out headlines of major retailers, governments, and social media sites being broken into for personal information, mockery, or even to instigate real physical war. The recent surge of technological advances has brought attention to a deadly force once overlooked by all, the hackers. These individuals commit cyber-crimes because they can retain anonymity, it is easier and less dangerous than a physical crime, and it makes it easy to draw attention on whatever it is they are attacking, which is why we as a society need to be educated on their motives and means of attack to protect us from their criminal actions. Criminals seem to be evolving at a quicker rate than technology, learning lessons from past criminals being caught and/or killed and adapting to the changing “smart” society.

Cyber criminals take pride in creating chaos, and the chaos that cyber criminals inflict on their victims can be crippling to individuals and corporations. We have all heard about hackers getting information from major retail chains as well as information being leaked that included Social Security numbers for millions of people. We use the internet with somewhat of a naivete expectation that all of our information is safe. That is, until something untoward occurs, and then it can be all out panic.

Yesterday’s simple attacks that caused containable damage have given way to modern cybercrime operations that are sophisticated, well-funded, and capable of causing major disruption to organizations (Oliver, 2014).