Cyber Warfare – Not Fiction Anymore

Don't think that cyber warfare is merely fuel for novel writers. Cyber attacks are being waged in increasing numbers - and not by geeky hackers sitting in their bed or dorm rooms either. Computer network attacks are often perpetrated by gangs of professional criminal hackers attempting to break into a system for financial gain. But now there is an even new twist. Some criminal hacker groups are starting to test the same strategies on government agencies. Though political attacks haven't been as common as those seeking personal and corporate information, cyber attacks for political purposes could just as easily be used as a weapon against governments. A country's national security could be severely threatened by a team of hackers successfully cracking certain computer systems run by government agencies. Case in point - Estonia.  Last April, Estonian government and corporate Web sites were under constant attack by about 1 million computers worldwide. Over a three-week period, the attacks swamped Estonia's computer network with so much traffic that the government there was forced to shut them down. The Estonian government reportedly traced much of the attacking traffic to Russian computers and found instructions in Russian on the Internet on how to carry out the attack. The Russian government denied any involvement. No mater why the attacks happened it has served as a wake up call to governments world-wide.