I am trying to see these activities and the responses to this thread in the lnterests of the IG community. As posited by some of these responses, these attack could be:<br><ol><li> A means of buying time while resources are being marshalled for the real and more devastating attack.</li>
<li>Nuisance attacks aimed at undercutting real value such as labour time, and or equipment time that could have been used for increased productivity.</li><li>Depending on who is suspected of initiating the threat, It could be a red herring strategy designed to give the Western powers an excuse to go after radical and internet containment regimes.</li>
</ol><p>I cannot fully agree that banks are fullly secure, as i do not believe the losses and costs of internet attacks on banks are not necessarily readily available to the non bank community. Banks are always vulnerable as their main currency is trust, when that is eroded either through their own actions or the actions of others the result could be catastrophic. It is not even necessary to have successful attacks, as long as information on the attacks can be published in such a way that it undermines public trust.</p>
<p>With Social Network Sales projected to grow in 2012 from $US3B to $US14B by 2015, They will become fair targets for interception and redirection strategies which again could affect consumer confidence in social networks as a sales tool.</p>
<p>I guess this is just the tip of of the ice berg, civil society who will most likely be the main victims in these scenarios, need to develop the necessary awareness of those basic internet habits that are detrimental to their online security, and those habits they need to build so that they may increase that same security.</p>
<p><br></p><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Oct 19, 2012 at 9:33 PM, Chaitanya Dhareshwar <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:chaitanyabd@gmail.com" target="_blank">chaitanyabd@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
<div>The war's been on for years now. (with an unseen/unrecognizable enemy)</div><div> </div><div>Actually with today's fast moving world, time is a more critical commodity. I'll take spam as an example. </div>
<div> </div><div>If it's possible to have people spend 10 minutes more checking spam, or make people check their email less often due to the vast amount of spam in it, the attack has claimed a victim. </div><div> </div>
<div>The implications are pretty significant - it may just be 10 minutes per person - but weekly it adds up to almost an hour of active email checking/deleting - plus the risk of a worm/virus coming in with the message. For an organization with 1000 people it's 1000 man hours per week wasted - which costs a fortune. In defence projects and suchlike inspite of safety measures if one worm gets into the facility it can waste even 10 times more time than that (because nobody wants a worm crawling around on their network). </div>
<div> </div><div>Yes money is important - but with other victims easier to take like time, social media account information (because most are fairly careful with their bank details now-a-days) - it's still fairly easy to make a strike.</div>
<div> </div><div>Just IMHO, for the consumer/customer I'd rank time > virus-threat > password theft, and given 90% people already check the security certificate (or look for the 'green bar' on FF) I'd say financial theft is slightly less likely, and most consumers would not care too much as long as there's no theft. Most think SSL is bulletproof!! They trust the banks (and their security) implicitly. </div>
<div> </div><div>For financials it's usually to get an alternative if the online banking service is offline - like phonebanking or sms banking - or pop down to an ATM and check the cash... Not as much of a threat as long as there's no data theft (which, TBH, the banks are doing a good job of keeping safe).</div>
<div> </div><div>-C<br><br></div><div class="gmail_quote"><div><div class="h5">On Sat, Oct 20, 2012 at 12:19 AM, Devon Blake <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:devonrb@gmail.com" target="_blank">devonrb@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
</div></div><blockquote style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;padding-left:1ex;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-width:1px;border-left-style:solid" class="gmail_quote"><div><div class="h5">
<a href="http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/u-banks-under-cyber-attack-iran-money-safe-151123675.html" target="_blank">http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/u-banks-under-cyber-attack-iran-money-safe-151123675.html</a><br>
Is this a response to Stuxnet? or is this the beginning of a cyberwar?<span><font color="#888888"><br clear="all">
<br>-- <br>Devon Blake<br>Special Projects Director<br>Earthwise Solutions Limited<br>29 Dominica Drive<br>Kgn 5<br>,Phone: Office <a href="tel:876-968-4534" value="+18769684534" target="_blank">876-968-4534</a>, Mobile, <a href="tel:876-483-2632" value="+18764832632" target="_blank">876-483-2632</a><br>
<br>To be kind, To be helpful, To network<br><b><i>Earthwise ... For Life!</i></b><br>
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</blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><br>-- <br>Devon Blake<br>Special Projects Director<br>Earthwise Solutions Limited<br>29 Dominica Drive<br>Kgn 5<br>,Phone: Office 876-968-4534, Mobile, 876-483-2632<br><br>To be kind, To be helpful, To network<br>
<b><i>Earthwise ... For Life!</i></b><br><div style="padding:0px;margin-left:0px;margin-top:0px;overflow:hidden;word-wrap:break-word;color:black;font-size:10px;text-align:left;line-height:130%"></div><br>