[governance] TitaDYN

[Paul Lehto]

Domestically here in the USA, it is being reported that an "unprecedented
new method" of DDoS attack was used, utilizing the MIrai virus on thousands
of devices on the Internet of Things. Because owners of these devices
probaby wouldn't notice that their devices had been hijacked, there is
little incentive for either manufacturers or users to mitigate this route
of attack.

Predictably, it was first reported as likely being a foreign/RussIan attack
on Dyn, taking out twitter, paypal, reddit and netflix for a period of time
with data hitting Dyn at a rate of 1.2 tera per second, more than double
any known previous attack. It was also deemed to be probing for weaknesses
for future attacks. A previously unknown international "New World"
collective has since claimed responsibility and also claimed it's next
target is Russia, in retaliation for its cyberattacks. This seems somewhat
dubious.

The choice of Dyn as a target temporarily blinded the eyes, ears and voice
of activists left and right by affecting twitter and reddit. For context,
days ago, three were charged in Kansas with conspiracy to use a weapon of
mass destruction the day after the election, namely a truck bomb against a
Somalian refugee living center and mosque.  It is doubtfuo this was the
onoy such effort anywhere in the country.

Perhaps the biggest controversy in the presidential election concerns the
question of whether there will be a peaceful transition of power in the USA
given the widespread accusations by the Trump campaign that the general
election and the system are rigged. This allegation has more credibility
than the media here admit, given the undisputed DNC leaks via Wikileaks
establishing that the system was biased and/or rigged against Bernie
Sanders in the primary, in favor of Hillary Clinton,  and in violation of
the neutrality rules of the Democratic National Committee itself.
Furthermore, the fact that essentially all votes are counted
nontransparently on proprietary computer systems, and that the US Supreme
Court case Bush v Gore (2000) stands for the proposition (among other
things) that recounts of paper ballots (which do not even exist in all
states) can be halted by courts and that there wasn't sufficient time in
2000 to complete the 100% recount Bush v. GORE holds is the only
constitutionally acceptable recount adds a lot of fuel to concerns and to
the election rigging fire.  Nobody will know exactly what happens on vote
counting hard drives, so one side will claim a fair election based on no
evidence, and the other side will claim an unfair election based on either
no evidence or scattered reports - the evidence simply isn't available to
anyone and there isn't time for a computer forensic analysis that few would
clearly understand anyway, leading merely to a battle of experts in the
media. In sum, there is no rational evidentiary basis (faith and trust not
being rational and evidentiary) that the election will be fair, and vice
versa. That won't stop partisans from strongly endorsing the result or
strongly condemning it.

In the event of election unrest, or civil unrest of any kind, one has to
expect that the US government would take any action necessary to put out
the fire. This may well include taking down the portions of the Internet
that may be used for potentially revolutionary means or for criminal means.
That would include but not be limited to twitter, reddit and other targets
actually affected by this Dyn attack.  The implications are that nobody
really knows who is behind the attack, and some even initially suggested
wikileaks, which at one point tweeted (wasn't twitter down?) a request for
their supporters to stand down, because the point had been made.  But that
may also be explained by a plausible wikileaks desire to I stance itself
from any blame, given there were rumors of Assange having trouble and being
surrounded by police at the time, and conceivably an unaffiliated wikileaks
supporter could have been retaliating. It was also confirmed in that Tweet
that Assange was still alive.

The level of near hysteria in the USA about Russian hacking is remarkable,
but skepticism of those claims is relatively widespread outside the media.
It would appear that one of the implications is that these kinds of attacks
combined with other techniques could certainly make the internet go dark.
One can't rule out governmental actors as being responsible (even the US
government agrees a nation state appears involved), and the biggest
beneficiary of taking out Internet resources through a larger and sustained
Dyn-like attack could well be the American government itself, seeking a
"peaceful transition" of power, regardless of whether the electionary is
rigged or not, or fair or not. But naturally it would be extremely poor
optics for any governmental actor from any country to be seen as involved,
so one can only make educated guesses for now.

Paul Lehto, J.D.

On Sunday, October 23, 2016, Jefsey <jefsey at jefsey.com> wrote:

> Interested in knowing if anyone noticed the attack on DYN's and
> thought about its implications?
> jfc
>
>

-- 
Paul R Lehto, J.D.
P.O. Box 2952
Watford City, ND 58854
lehto.paul at gmail.com
906-204-4965 (cell)
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