Analysis : Implications of Internet Growth
Introduction
With the proliferation of the Internet and Operating System capabilities our nation has transformed into a highly vulnerable state. The U.S. military and civilian sectors rely upon critical infrastructures to provide a variety of vital services ranging from emergency services to telecommunications, financial transactions to government services. Within the last decade the fine line of separation between Military (or Government) and civilian sectors grows thinner and almost translucent. The threat of Cyber Crime will have to currently target both sides of the paradigm. No regulation or watching authority oversees the critical infrastructures that store and transmit unbelievable amounts of data each day. This ?Non-Policing? is a double edged sword which will play a major role in the future of our Internet.
Pro?s
Growth of the Web and Technology.
The ?Non-Policing? has been a Political issue that tip toes around the First Amendment guarantees of Freedom of Speech. By keeping this policy in place the Web has grown exponentially due to the lack of any restrictions holding it back. This scenario encourages a more expedited release of technology to the end user. I do not foresee any change to this situation in he near future.
Information.
Where other than the Web can you find the quantity of information on diverse topics? This information also includes programs or tools, available on the Internet, for people to use. Freeware is making large operating systems change their products to include these capabilities in their end product.
Connectivity.
In the last decade WAN and Intranets have become the standard of business communications. This is a relatively new phenomenon. Chat programs and email have dramatically expedited the sharing of information.
Disinformation.
Believe it or not disinformation has a good use on the Internet. Government agencies use this to cloud the opposing sides of issues with so much information that users do not know what to believe. This may be why there are so many weird sites out there.
Now to the Dark Side of the Internet.
Technology Growth.
Non-Policing is simply that. Imagine if there was no police on the streets. Well currently that is what the Internet is like. Many nations are on one communication system, with different laws and judicial systems as regulations. The only convictable crimes are the ones against the Major corporations with money. Nothing happens to the everyday Joe at home when someone hacks into their system, or stalks them. Chaos is the word that comes to mind when considering this scenario.
Wide-Band communications are relatively new and will play into many roles in the future. Take a Denial Of Service scenario, of a Dial up account versus ADSL. The end product diverges extremely between the two sides. The always-on feature throws many newbies into the situation as well. They do not recognize anything about security or how their computers can be misused; they just realize they can surf faster. However, the real players on the Internet understand that Bandwidth is power.
Programs.
Malicious programs are easy to obtain and currently take little or no knowledge to execute, yes script kiddies. Some of the programs are so destructive that to make them available is like giving a gun to a retard. This scenario becomes a horror story when played out to its fullest extent. At least programmers can visualize what the outcome of their attacks against targets will be. Chat programs recently have become the back door or vulnerability of choice being exploited. Virus programs have been using these applications as a propagation tool recently.
Email/Outlook.
With the last virus incidents I have had to shut down email services for my entire establishment sometimes for days. The replies of ?we can not work without email? are common. The dependency on this service has grown tremendously in the last decade. When you look at it from our point of view it is the easiest feature to take out. The other big hit on email is that it can be monitored very easily, and the monitoring is hard to detect. To my knowledge there is nothing on the market that detects monitoring of email, only alteration.
Disinformation.
I can not tell you how many virus hoaxes I get a week from people at my employment. Some of them are down right funny when looking at the capabilities of the so-called virus. One even talked about erasing a VCR settings (Insert ?HA-HA wave from the Simpsons). Uninformed people are terrified when they see scenarios like this.
The Internet has grown tremendously in the last decade. Some say too fast for the integration of business/government applications and their dependency. New applications and devices are being implemented without any kind of examination of security implications. Many users are not aware of the threats and realities of the Internet and the people online. Something is going to change very soon and it will be an interesting outcome to see.
1.) Daemon
processes - psyops
2.)Analysis
: Implications of Internet Growth - CptZZap
3.)The Art of
IRC - JesterS
4.)Network
Stacks & TCP/IP - Liquid Sphear
5.)Basics of
Internet Investigations - madirish
6.)Proliferation of
the Internet
7.)Having fun
with system.ini - xearthed
8.)A look into
VPNs and setting one up - L33tdawg
9.)Review of
DIVA LAN ISDN Router - L33tdawg
10.)Strategies
for Tomorrows War - Cpt ZZap
