We have the technology, but so do they....in the event that there is a cyber attack, the idea is that the US army be able to take over your computer for the greater good of the country. However, if we compare ourselves to our bigger cousins, China...we pail in that comparison.
China could easily afford to have 250 million machines to node together into a massive botnet, sort of what we have seen the likes of with that virus STORM. We probably could accomadate 10 million machines, if there are that many infected with a special malware the army created.
There are also those special organisations..like google...that allow you to donate your cpu cycles for a special reason (like doing cancer stem cell research) which in the end makes us feel like we are doing our part, but who says that those mega machines are not infected with the same virus or worm, thereby coming back full circle as if you had the malware installed on your pc.
We match our 10 million to their 250 million, and we have to wonder...is this why we are login the cyber war??? What can we do differently, or better, to make sure this type of thing does not happen.
I would recommend something along the lines of an organised committee, that analyses the current threat that countries may pose based on their advanced techonlogy or access to...and formulate a way to moderate a country's progress. Let's say for example Africa was starting a special project to get some computers into schools.... this would be classified as mundane.
If you took a third world country that just finished purchasing special servers that allow multi processing of complex nature, sort of what you need to use to guide missles...well then we would have to review the background of where that hardware was going, and account for its presence at all times.
In the case of a botnet, it is the sum of the small parts that make the whole...does that mean we should limit the amount of computers allowed...or limit the connectivity of those computers to internet access...or anything that might put a small dent into that armor?
Who is to say, but it is something to think about in the years to come, especially now that we are seeing more and more cyber threats surfacing and making theirpresence known. ID Fraud, CC fraud, email scams....spamming, omg spamming! Just food for thought.
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