Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Figures
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Hostile Conquest as Information Warfare
- 3 Information Warfare as Noise
- 4 Can Information Warfare Be Strategic?
- 5 Information Warfare Against Command and Control
- 6 Friendly Conquest in Cyberspace
- 7 Friendly Conquest Using Global Systems
- 8 Retail Conquest in Cyberspace
- 9 From Intimacy, Vulnerability
- 10 Talking Conquest in Cyberspace
- 11 Managing Conquest in Cyberspace
- Appendix A Why Cyberspace Is Likely to Gain Consequence
- Index
9 - From Intimacy, Vulnerability
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Figures
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Hostile Conquest as Information Warfare
- 3 Information Warfare as Noise
- 4 Can Information Warfare Be Strategic?
- 5 Information Warfare Against Command and Control
- 6 Friendly Conquest in Cyberspace
- 7 Friendly Conquest Using Global Systems
- 8 Retail Conquest in Cyberspace
- 9 From Intimacy, Vulnerability
- 10 Talking Conquest in Cyberspace
- 11 Managing Conquest in Cyberspace
- Appendix A Why Cyberspace Is Likely to Gain Consequence
- Index
Summary
Close relationships in cyberspace, as in real life, can make either partner more vulnerable. A relationship, solely by virtue of the value it brings to its partners, may be attacked by competitors of each. Third parties can exploit weaknesses in one to get at others. More insidiously but, fortunately, less commonly, one partner may exploit the relationship to wend its way into – and from that vantage point, to assault – the systems of partners.
Love and war, so famously mated in fiction, find echo in cyberspace. Here one asks: by what means, and with what effect?
Do the Walls Really Come Down?
Two organizations that would exchange information on a continual basis can most seamlessly do so by merging their respective systems, thereby creating a common cyberspace so that members of one gain full access to the resources, data, and applications of the other.
Yet, with all the risks of intimacy that arise from unprotected networking, are enterprises so likely to lower their barriers entirely? Furthermore, is it that necessary? After all, internal barriers are routine even within single organizations. Rightly or wrongly, many organizations maintain a hierarchy of privilege with respect to seeing information. Others adopt compartmentation in the belief that any sufficiently interesting piece of information known to enough people within an organization is bound to be known to the wrong person outside of it. Similarly, any corruptible systems process accessible to enough people on the inside will eventually become corrupted.
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- Conquest in CyberspaceNational Security and Information Warfare, pp. 220 - 230Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2007