# US Pentagon to treat cyber-attacks as 'acts of war'



## skycloud86 (Jul 15, 2009)

> The US is set to publish plans that will categorise cyber-attacks as acts of war, the Pentagon says.
> 
> In future, a US president could consider economic sanctions, cyber-retaliation or a military strike if key US computer systems were attacked, officials have said recently.
> 
> ...


BBC News - US Pentagon to treat cyber-attacks as 'acts of war'


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## sofort99 (Mar 27, 2010)

Good. It's about time.


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## Wheelie (Apr 2, 2010)

*sigh*
Nuke someone for hacking into a computer.


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## DarklyValentine (Mar 4, 2010)

The same government who regularly experiments on its own people
woohoo


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## Cover3 (Feb 2, 2011)

Just as long as they don't use that excuse to create an internet-censorship thing under the guise of security, which they actually push for as of right now.. the double standard concerning this announcement is quite amusing too:

Mideast Mystery: Did Israel Cyber Attack Target Iran Nuke Program? - Tech Talk - CBS News

Iranian Military Official: Siemens helped U.S. and Israel in Cyber Attack on Nuclear Program - Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News

Iran accuses Siemens over Stuxnet virus attack | Reuters


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## Mutatio NOmenis (Jun 22, 2009)

It's like we're saying "Don't steal my porn or I'll send you Navy SEALS!"
I agree that we should be taking a stance to protect our cyber assets.


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## absentminded (Dec 3, 2010)

Willy said:


> *sigh*
> Nuke someone for hacking into a computer.


Eh...hacking into said computer could destroy the American economy, leak military secrets or allow foreign entities to to alter or falsify information that leaders are dependent upon.

That and I don't believe that anybody talked about nuking anyone.


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## Glenda Gnome Starr (May 12, 2011)

:tongue:If "they" crash our computers, "we" could hire hackers to crash their computers, and, soon, everyone will have to send Snail Mail. Maybe we could be issued quill pens, too.


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## StandingTiger (Dec 25, 2010)

"US Pentagon to treat cyber-attacks as 'acts of war'"?

lol.


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## sprinkles (Feb 7, 2010)

Problem: there are people building botnets. They are growing. This is why security and a firewall is so important _for you_.

Botnets are intended to steal computing resources and create redundancy for massive networks for malicious intent. Mostly right now they are used for sending spam and mining information such as credit card numbers. 

A lot of people are on a botnet and don't even know it. The goal of a botnet is not to hurt your computer, it is quite the opposite - it is to _use_ your computer for their purposes without you knowing about it. They can be like little network ninjas, just sitting in your computer, quietly, until they need to be used. If they harm your computer it clues you in that the botnet exists and therefore you try to get rid of it, which is not helpful to the botnet. So they stay as low key as they can until it's time to be used. If discovered, it's no big loss, they have more.

It would be foolish for anyone to attack a government using their own personal network. That's like running into a war naked with a giant target painted on you.


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## Obsidean (Mar 24, 2010)

So it begins.


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## RobynC (Jun 10, 2011)

What greater way for a government to assert unlimited power over a domain by claiming that it is a domain for waging war. 

Clearly this cyber-security issue is not about really protecting our networks, but merely means for the government to assert ever more control over the internet, as well as the means to perform massive autonomous surveillance and data-mining.


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