Russia and China's 'digital authoritarianism' means we need to better arm our cyber troops, warns top UK general
- Reference: 1601630113
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/10/02/digital_authoritarianism_general_nick_carter/
- Source link:
General Sir Nick Carter told the Policy Exchange think tank that countries such as China are setting out to undermine the West's ability to deter aggression by investing heavily in non-traditional methods of waging war.
Observing how "our rivals" had watched Western nations' misadventures in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya, the general warned that other countries had "invested in space and cyber" as well as building "electronic warfare" capabilities and drone-swarming technology.
"China's new Strategic Support Force is designed to achieve dominance in the space and cyber domains," said the professional head of the armed forces. "It commands satellite information attack and defence forces; electronic assault forces and internet assault forces; campaign information operations forces, which include conventional electronic warfare forces, anti-radiation assault forces, and battlefield cyber warfare forces."
That's a lot of forces.
General Carter also singled out Russia and China's exporting of [1]digital authoritarianism *, warning that technological advances are being used to strangle liberty and democracy at birth, stating that the concept "also explores how the Chinese Communist Party is forging a future of mass surveillance and 'social credit scores' and is rapidly exporting these tools to other parts of the world".
As major policy speeches go, this was quite muted despite its clear statement of intent to deploy more of Britain's well-hidden [2]"offensive cyber" capabilities. The Chief of the Defence Staff spoke about how British state-sponsored hackers might "actively constrain [an enemy] in the cyber domain to protect critical national infrastructure in the maritime domain", as an example of how the UK might start hacking authoritarian countries trying to harm British interests.
Yet there was little in the way of active promises that Britain's enemies could soon expect state-backed crews to start targeting their critical national infrastructure, in the way that Russian and Chinese APTs (among other nations) target the UK and the wider Western World. Perhaps, in light of recent government pledges to break international law in a " [3]specific and limited way ", Britain's top general didn't want to trigger another reputational crisis. ®
Bootnote
General Carter was clearly referring to US military blog War on the Rocks' series about [4]digital authoritarianism when he made his speech. Unfortunately for the British general, the blog about China includes this sentence: "However, China is not the only actor responsible for supplying repressive technology. Other countries, such as Israel, France, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Russia, also supply advanced capabilities to repressive regimes – from location-tracking spyware and hi-resolution video surveillance, to hacking software, and censorship filtering applications."
Its author, Steven Feldstein, then wrote: "If the United States truly wants to get serious about restricting the global spread of authoritarian technology, then it should push for comprehensive restrictions that would apply to both democratic suppliers as well as autocratic producers like China."
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[1] https://warontherocks.com/2020/02/when-it-comes-to-digital-authoritarianism-china-is-a-challenge-but-not-the-only-challenge/
[2] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/sep/25/britain-has-offensive-cyberwar-capability-top-general-admits
[3] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-54073836
[4] https://warontherocks.com/2020/02/when-it-comes-to-digital-authoritarianism-china-is-a-challenge-but-not-the-only-challenge/
[5] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Myself, I blame
the Grand Panjandrum with the round button at the top. And the Garyulies, and Joblillies and the rest of the crew. If it wasn't for the gunpowder running out of their boots, they'd've blown the whole world up by now - together with the Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz, of course.
Speaking facetiously, it illustrates a point, that nuclear weapons have been made obsolete - by AT&T, BSD, et allii ... it's a lot cheaper to bring a country down by sowing discord and distrust of its institutions and doubt about its currency and future and blackmailing its head honchos and top doofuses(?)/doofi(?) than it is to go the whole enchilada with capital weapon systems - they're just a backup now, for when your enemy refuses to lie down and take it quietly.
There is little difference
Between the top sellers of conventional arms and the top sellers of the accoutrements of digital authoritarianism, in many cases those items come assured, having been tried and tested at home.
Maybe not so well hidden......
Quote: "...Britain's well-hidden "offensive cyber" capabilities..."
*
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/sep/13/gchq-data-collection-violated-human-rights-strasbourg-court-rules
*
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/sep/21/british-spies-hacked-into-belgacom-on-ministers-orders-claims-report
*
......and so on. Let's get real here.......everyone is doing the same things......there are NO GOOD GUYS....not even in Cheltenham!
Re: Maybe not so well hidden......
Seconded
Authoritarian governments collapse from the bottom up (see Belarus, Ukraine for examples of partial and full collapse).
Democracies collapse from the top down, (see Turkey Hungary and USA for examples of partial and full collapse).
An authoritarian government needs control of the people, because it does not have the numbers to hold power by support of the populace. It needs the infrastructure of surveillance and control to catch and suppress dissent early.
Democratic governments need the opposite, they need to checks and balances at every level, verification of everything. To flip a democratic government needs all those checks and balances undermined. Those layers of protections make it harder for a puppet to flip the democracy.
Strip away the layers of checks and balances and a democracy can be flipped faster. GCHQ did much of that prep-work.
Betcha Trump is lying about Covid19. Same doctor that stated about Trump taking hydroxychloroquinoline is stating he tested positive for Covid 19. Sean P Conley, the Physician to the President.
https://twitter.com/anitakumar01/status/1262534996750929922
I'm expecting an October surprise where Republicans SUDDENLY are totally worried about Coronavirus and SUDDENLY want to stop the election because of the dangers of holding elections during a virus. Three states, three conspirators, DeSantis, Kemp, and likely Abbott to do the U-turn, having spent so much effort spreading the virus, suddenly doing the opposite.
So show me the old orange liar in a bed gasping out "I can't breathe", and then I'll believe he really has Covid 19. On the other hand if the Republican Governors that spent so much effort spreading the virus start flipping to wanting to kill the election, my suspicions will be confirmed.
Digital authoritarianism? Just Russia and China? Think again.
" If the United States truly wants to get serious about restricting the global spread of authoritarian technology ... "
I'm sorry, where on Earth did you get that idea ?
In case you haven't noticed, the USA is getting more authoritarian by the day. The only thing the US Government wants to restrict is people's privacy, and also it wants to be the only country to invade that.
When the world used the tactics of China's response to Corona I knew that everyone is getting moved into that direction.
What's not to like? Petrified citizens (for no reason) conditioned to accept martial law and overt tracking. What a gift Corona has been.
Other countries, such as Israel, France, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Russia, also supply advanced capabilities to repressive regimes – from location-tracking spyware and hi-resolution video surveillance, to hacking software, and censorship filtering applications."
Too right - where there is money to be made there are sods in most countries who will happily take it from anyone.