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Summary
Security Class 09

THE CLASS STARTED WITH A BRIEF OVERVIEW OF THE PREVIOUS TOPICS (05:01 PM)

LINKAGES BETWEEN ORGANIZED CRIME AND TERRORISM IN INDIA (05:04 PM)

  • Few examples of organized crimes in India:
  • Naxalism in 2014, took extortion money of around 1,500 crore from contractors, businesses, and officials. A lot of time naxalism asks for protection money in mining and resource-rich areas.
  • Drug trafficking in Punjab and the Hawala network is a example of organized crime.
  • The North East has close proximity with Myanmar and hence human and drug trafficking was also happening through porous borders.
  • Kashmir: (Overground ground workers) OGW's: Ban on the Jamat-e-Islami. External funding was also identified in the Kashmir areas thorugh the organized groups.
  • Challenges in dealing with Organized Crime:
  • Inadequate legal framework, only a few states have enacted specific legislation to deal with organized crimes.
  • Furthermore provisions under the IPC are not enough to deal with the challenges of organized crime.
  • Weakness of enforcement agencies like Poor training.
  • Shortage of arms and ammunition diminishes the capabilities of enforcement agencies to deal with organized crimes.
  • The problems get further compounded due to a lack of coordination between various agencies such as the State police, ED, CBI and NCB.
  • Growth in technology: There has been a massive increase in cyber crimes and enforcement agencies lack the capabilities to deal with them.
  • In 2021, illicit transactions done using cryptocurrency were estimated to be around 14 billion US dollars.
  • Vested interests and unholy nexus criminals, politicians and bureaucrats, businessmen, etc.
  • This unholy nexus paralyzes the ability of the enforcement agencies to gather evidence or to take strict actions because of a strictly hierarchical network of functioning.
  • Lack of coordination between domestic and international agencies.

CYBER SECURITY (05:44 PM)

  • Warfare Generations First Generation Warfare Second Generation Warfare Third Generation Warfare Fourth Generation Warfare
    Timeline before 1830 1830-1918 1918-1945 1945 onwards
    Tools and Techniques  Assualt rifles, ammunitions, artillery

    Automated artillery, Movement of troops is fast through steam engines, railways, and aeroplanes.

    Since 1908, Aeroplanes were also used and it opened a new theatre of command i.e. Airspace. 

    Tactical weapons were used like Blitzkrieg tactics.

    Nuclear Capabilities.

    Unconventional Warfares.

     
  • Concepts/Terminolgies:
  • 1) Irregular Warfare:
  • Often thought of oldest form of warfare.
  • Irregular warfare is one where a significant proportion of the fighting forces are not conventional armed forces/security agencies.
  • Territorial gains are not the targets but to acquire influence over the people.
  • For Example, 'Operation Gulmarg' in Kashmir.
  • These are low-intensity conflicts conducted over a long period of time.
  • 2) Unconventional Warfare:
  • It is warfare which is directed at promoting insurgent activities in the target states to either overthrow/coerce political authority with the use of a guerrilla force or underground force.
  • The cyber warfare is considered unconventional warfare.
  • Cyberspace is a new dimension of warfare.
  • Characteristics of unconventional warfare:
  • Use of indirect/covert approach
  • Participation of irregular surrogates.
  • Use of psychological tools to win over the targeted population.
  • For Example: The nexus between ISI and khalistani groups.
  • 3) Hybrid Warfare:
  • It is a combination of both Conventional and unconventional warfare.
  • This warfare tries to exploit multiple vulnerabilities of the target states simultaneously. (DIMEFLIP)

  • D-Diplomatic, 

    I-Information

    M-Military

    E-Economic

    F-Finance

    L-Law

    I- Intelligence

    P-Population.
  • Cyber Warfare:
  • Disadvantages of Kinetic warfare:
  • Currently there is a huge detterence distance created between nuclear and non-nuclear nations
  • Furthermore countries like the USA with their defence expenditure ranging to the tune of around 900 Million dollars have only widened the gulf between the conventional capabilities of various nation-states.
  • In this context, cyberwarfare offers several advantages as follows:
  • a) Symmetricity:
  • Cyber warfare can be organized at the state level and even at a personal level.
  • Cyber warfare can also be short-term or even long term for example, an attack on a nation's power grid will be spontaneous while cyber espionage could be protracted.
  • A dozen hackers even less equipped just with connected devices like computers, tablets, etc. can bring an economy's digital infrastructure down.
  • In other words cyber warfare offers cost advantages also.
  • b) Preference to offence:
  • The Internet is designed to be collaborative and hence there will always be vulnerability.
  • Cyber criminals understand that much like kinetic warfare, speed matters the most in cyber attacks.
  • This is the reason why they will always be on the lookout to exploit 'zero-day vulnerabilities'
  • c) Integrated/Combined Warfare:
  • Cyber capabilities can be integrated with conventional military capabilities for the highest returns.
  • i.e. They can go on simultaneously with conventional battles and can paralyze the target state.
  • Example: Information warfare.
  • d) Plausible deniability:
  • Cyber conflicts are usually low-intensity conflicts.
  • They are also non-lethal and hence the Geneva Convention does not apply in addition since the actors involved in attacks could be non-state actors.
  • The usual instruments of the state become non-transferable.
  • In contemporary times boundaries are permeable when it comes to information, i.e. the internet allows the exchange of information with the least regard for territorial boundaries.
  • This nature of the internet further complicates the scenario for the target state because attacks can be made to appear as though they were coming from different regions (Distributed Servers)

CYBERSPACE (07:20 PM)

  • Cyberspace includes:
  • a) The physical foundations and infrastructure.
  • b) Logical building blocks that support the infrastructure and enable services (Program files)
  • c) The information which is stored on these devices/networks or transmitted through these devices.
  • d) The actors, entities and users with various interests who are part of this cyberspace.
  • Cyber Attacks:
  • A cyber attack refers to an unauthorized intrusion into the computer or a computer network.
  • Types of Cyberattacks:
  • a) Cybercrimes:
  • The non-state actor tries to do the crime.
  • b) Cyber espionage:
  • State entities targeting the nations and trying to steal the information.
  • c) Cyber warfare:
  • A cyberwarfare combines the sophistication of a hacker and the targeted hostile intent of a cybercriminal and manifests itself as a full-blown conflict between two nation-states.
  • Stages of Cyberwarfare:
  • Planning: In this stage, the nation-state tries to identify specific vulnerabilities of the target state's cyber environment.
  • corresponding to these vulnerabilities it customs cyber weapons.
  • Reconnaissance:  In this stage weapons are released after finding the vulnerabilities. The weapon scans the systems to identify potential vulnerabilities and other aspects.
  • Replication stage: At this stage the weapon has identified more than one vulnerability and has replicated itself to exploit these vulnerabilities, although the footprint of the weapon is rising, it continues to be in stealth mode.
  • Assault/Attack stage: It is here that the weapon is unleashed and it carries out the mission, in the target environment. In this stage, the weapon may or may not remain in stealth mode. This could be followed by a counter-assault.
  • Obfuscation stage: It is here the mission has been accomplished and the cyber weapon hides or self-destroys.
  • Withdrawal: The withdrawal stage is when parties enter into an agreement. There is no active weapon on either side during the withdrawal phase.
  • For Example, The 'Stuxnet Attack' (USA-Iran) The weapon targeted zero-day vulnerabilities on Microsoft Windows machines and networks and Siemens software which was used in the Iran nuclear plants.

TOPIC FOR THE NEXT CLASS: INDIA'S CYBER SECURITY ARCHITECTURE.