COMMENT: How Cyber Warriors Can Bring The UK To A Standstill

By Christopher Lee, Defence Analyst.

Russian cyber teams could create chaos in the UK within three days and bring the country to a standstill in under ten days.

News reports suggest that cyber-attacks on essential social and government systems are a result of the US coalition attack on Syrian chemical warfare units.

This is not so.

The UK Intelligence assessment is based on analysis long before the attacks.

Russia has a Cyber Warrior Command within the state military structure that launches attacks and exercises against Western systems and infrastructures - and for the past six months, a new cyber protection unit has opened protecting Russian systems against attacks by the UK, US and China.

China has a major but poorly coordinated cyber warrior system.

Russia’s is a greater threat to Western Europe and the UK, and it is not all official.

A unique threat from Russia comes from irregular and highly intelligent and motivated youth groups - top-end IT students kicking over rules and anti-cyber restrictions at will.

In Moscow, the nashi organization controls and directs the major youth groups but others operate on their own picking targets at will.

A further threat is already identified by what Western Intelligence people refer to RBN, Russian Business Network - the criminal-owned cyber systems that are in many cases more advanced than the government teams.

Some of the criminal cyber individuals are being hired by the Russian military to fill gaps in expertise.

So, what would the Russian or any other enemy cyber-warrior teams do in times of tension, including the crucial Transition To War (TTW) hours and days?

The key is what an enemy can do in the operational stage of TTW, which is based on Distributed Denial Of Services (DDOS).

As the name suggests, this is the capability of disrupting or freezing infrastructures upon which we all rely: medical, energy, communications at every level and even food supplies.

The British NHS relies entirely on computer routines from drug supplies, appointment availability, operation schedules, ambulance coordination (even refilling vehicles and crew availability) and most of all, responses to major events.

The NHS could be closed down by cyber warriors in 24 hours.

Fuel supplies could be cut off within three days and no energy supplies could reach the UK within 9 days.

The underwater energy system that connects to 3 million UK homes could be stopped in two days.

The biggest threat to the UK and one which would stop compensation and alternative systems to the collapse of those above is everyday communications - for example, the Russians could take out the 97 percent of UK-Overseas sub-marine global communications.

In short: cyber warriors could degrade UK civil systems and infrastructure so that they bring to a halt normal living, thus creating panic and divert ground-based military capabilities to protect society from itself.

During TTW, the biggest threat to the UK is not bombing but the fragility of its society when basic infrastructures go down.

Cyber Warriors can make that happen.