Volume 2, Issue 1

Volume 2, Issue 1 Editorial

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OCTOBER 2002

Welcome to the second volume of JIW. The journal was launched a year ago in September 2001 and has gone from strength to strength. The quality of the papers presented for review has generally been excellent. This issue not only reflects this high standard but also the variety of topics covered by the Information Warfare area. They range from the technologically oriented to those more concerned with social aspects.

Detecting Computer Network Attacks Using a Multi-objective Evolutionary Programming Approach

ABSTRACT

Attacks against computer networks are becoming more sophisticated, with adversaries using new attacks or modifying existing attacks. This research uses two types of multi-objective approaches, lexicographic and Pareto-based, in a multi- objective evolutionary programming algorithm to develop a new method for detecting such attacks. The approach evolves finite state transducers to detect attacks; this approach may allow the system to detect attacks with features similar to known attacks. Initial testing shows the algorithm performs satisfactorily in generating finite state transducers capable of detecting simulated attacks.

Forces, Targets, and Effects: Militarising Information Warfare

ABSTRACT

Information warfare is defined in terms of forces, targets, and effects. Each of these factors is examined to illustrate the practical and technical challenges facing the development of information warfare capabilities. Finally, the additional consideration of integrating information warfare with other disciplines is discussed. The author argues that expectations for information warfare should be limited, but that within those limitations, the concept has legitimacy and should be pursued by military forces.

Dominating the Attacker: Use of Intelligence and Counterintelligence in Cyberwarfare

ABSTRACT

In the event of cyberwarfare the defender must harden the attacker’s target by secure design, a defined security perimeter, and a suite of tools. Indeed, the defender must be ever alert and ready to react to attack. Over many years, defenders in traditional warfare have learned to predict the style, magnitude and possible outcomes of a physical attack, and how to deceive and confuse an attacker with the objective of changing the outcome. Perhaps the cyberwarfare defender can take a similar approach, by employing intelligence and counterintelligence techniques that are superior to those of the attacker.

Personalised Information Warfare - The New Homeland Defense

ABSTRACT

The increasing potential to network-connect our appliances brings with it a growing susceptibility to Personalized Information Warfare attacks. Existing network enabled computers, mobile phones and personal data appliances have proven to be vulnerable to a wide range of threats. Manufactures are currently supplying the general public with Internet enabled refrigerators, air-conditioners, televisions, video recorders and washing machines that are connected to the home network, consequently moving the threat spectrum for attacks from cyberspace into the home. This paper explores the opportunities for highly targeted Personalized Information Warfare that the explosion of net enabled appliances and emergent broadband technologies currently presents.

A Cultural Framework for the Interoperability of C2 systems

ABSTRACT

Command and Control research is focused on the use of communications and computer systems with the aim being to develop appropriate technology and methodologies to allow all kinds of warfare to be won. This situation is made complicated in joint and coalition operations that raise the need to deal with complex organizational and national cultural barriers. This paper extends the IFIP-IFAC (1999) GERAM enterprise framework with theoretical anthropological and organizational frameworks and creates a specific cultural framework that is applied to the interoperability of C2 systems in coalition operations.

Perception Management in the Art of War. A Review of Finnish War Propaganda and Present-Day Information Warfare

ABSTRACT

Perception management is integral to the art of war. Skillful use of information warfare, psychological operations and propaganda is problematic, however. Based on Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s theory of perception and the practical examples presented in this article – the Finnish Winter War and the war on terrorism – it can be held that perception and its interpretation can never be certain. If perceptions are manufactured, they can become counter-productive. The way in which perceptions arise is characterized by dynamism. According to Mzerleau-Ponty, there is always a middle ground between us and the enemy, a field that distorts and limits our view of the enemy. Therefore, in this article we propose that we can direct propaganda only towards ourselves.

A New Avenue of Attack: Event-driven System Vulnerabilities

ABSTRACT

Hacker Warfare is the type of Information Warfare that involves the inflicting of damage to the digital infrastructure of the enemy by exploiting security vulnerabilities. In this paper we discuss for the first time the exploitation of event-driven systems in order to inflict this type of damage. As an attacker may use command line parameters and network data to exploit security vulnerabilities in local and network applications respectively, he can use events against event-driven applications.

Design of a High Performance Implementation of the Rijndael Cipher Using Three-Level Architecture

ABSTRACT

For a long period of time, the Data Encryption Standard (DES) was considered as a standard for the symmetric key encryption. It has a key length of 64 bits. Due to the vast growing of processing speed, this small key length can easily be broken. According to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) will replace DES, as it is based on a key length of 128-bits or more. In the present paper, a design of a high performance implementation of the AES cipher will be proposed. An experimental performance evaluation of the proposed design will be provided. The experimental study will be applied for different block size lengths of the message to be encrypted. The performance of the proposed design will be evaluated considering a set of criteria such as the average execution encryption time per round, average encryption speed, speedup, and efficiency.

Sizing the Opportunity for Opportunistic Cybercriminals

ABSTRACT

According to Graboske, et al ‘the fundamental principle of criminology is that crime follows opportunity, and the opportunities for theft abound in the Digital Age’. But what is the extent of this opportunity? There are numerous hacker toolkits readily available from the Internet that exploits security weaknesses in target systems. This paper presents the results of a 11⁄2- year survey of websites that tested for such weaknesses. The author examined popular ‘hacker’ toolkits and assembled a data collection toolkit that tested for 70 exploits. Whilst some 2 million websites were targeted across the 57 most populous domains, 748,000 are reported. Of these, 77% displayed susceptibility to at least one exploit. Whilst this indicates significant opportunity, it also demonstrates the lack of capable guardianship by system owners and those tasked with protecting cyberspace. The facts that ISPs’ fail to collect identification details and allows bulk system scanning are factors that facilitate the commission of cybercrime.

Enhancing Response in Intrusion Detection Systems

ABSTRACT

With rising levels of attacks and misuse, intrusion detection systems are an increasingly important security technology for IT environments. However, while intrusion detection has been the focus of significant research, the issue of response has received relatively little attention. The majority of systems focus response efforts towards passive methods, which serve to notify and warn, but cannot prevent or contain an intrusion. Where more active responses are available, they typically rely upon manual initiation. The paper examines the reasons for this, and argues that a more comprehensive and reliable response framework is required in order to facilitate further automation of active responses. A range of factors are identified that a software-based responder agent could assess in order to improve response selection, and thereby increase trust in automated solutions.

Journal of Information Warfare

The definitive publication for the best and latest research and analysis on information warfare, information operations, and cyber crime. Available in traditional hard copy or online.

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Keywords

A

AI
APT

C

C2
C2S
CDX
CIA
CIP
CPS

D

DNS
DoD
DoS

I

IA
ICS

M

S

SOA

X

XRY

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The definitive publication for the best and latest research and analysis on information warfare, information operations, and cyber crime. Available in traditional hard copy or online.

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