Hybrid warfare: Rigging elections
Hillary Clinton has said Russia can influence the US presidential election. Trump has actually openly welcomed the intervention of the Russian hackers, and though Putin denies any Kremlin involvement in the DNC email hacking (as he always would, in such situations; remember how he initially denied Russian involvement in Donbass), Trump has openly praised the act, and even (sarcastically? seriously? who knows at this point) called for Russia to go ahead and hack Hillary's emails, too.
The hybrid warfare seems to be stepping up a gear these days. This is the first time Russian groups have been accused of a possible attempt to influence the outcome of an US election. Now Trump, being considered a pro-Putin Manchurian candidate with deep Kremlin ties (for whom both Russia and North Korea are rooting to win this election, by the way), has precipitated the process.
Even if Russia may seem in economic trouble after the EU sanctions due to its adventure in Ukraine and the Crimean annexation, as far as cyber warfare is concerned (being part of modern asymmetric warfare in this Cold War II), they're doing pretty damn good. In fact they're doing way better than China, because Russian hackers are well-organized, very focused, and apparently, state-funded. They don't shoot at random - they do concerted efforts to bring down well-chosen targets. Remember the whole Estonia debacle? They brought the entire Estonian economy on its knees within a couple of days when things got sour between those two countries (Estonia is a very hi-tech society, has developed a "digital government", and this makes it extremely vulnerable in that respect). Georgia became a victim to the Russian cyber-war-machine, too. And now, the US.
This is only going to get more serious. As we know, hackers are always a step ahead of any digital security technology, no matter how competent the defense is.
The question, why exactly would Russia be rooting for Trump, is another topic, which I leave to you.
The hybrid warfare seems to be stepping up a gear these days. This is the first time Russian groups have been accused of a possible attempt to influence the outcome of an US election. Now Trump, being considered a pro-Putin Manchurian candidate with deep Kremlin ties (for whom both Russia and North Korea are rooting to win this election, by the way), has precipitated the process.
Even if Russia may seem in economic trouble after the EU sanctions due to its adventure in Ukraine and the Crimean annexation, as far as cyber warfare is concerned (being part of modern asymmetric warfare in this Cold War II), they're doing pretty damn good. In fact they're doing way better than China, because Russian hackers are well-organized, very focused, and apparently, state-funded. They don't shoot at random - they do concerted efforts to bring down well-chosen targets. Remember the whole Estonia debacle? They brought the entire Estonian economy on its knees within a couple of days when things got sour between those two countries (Estonia is a very hi-tech society, has developed a "digital government", and this makes it extremely vulnerable in that respect). Georgia became a victim to the Russian cyber-war-machine, too. And now, the US.
This is only going to get more serious. As we know, hackers are always a step ahead of any digital security technology, no matter how competent the defense is.
The question, why exactly would Russia be rooting for Trump, is another topic, which I leave to you.