Conflict in the Digital Age

When most of the U.S. thinks of conflict in the cyber world they probably think about people sending hate e-mails to each other or putting advertisements out on the web that reflect the other’s business or company in a bad light. What the average citizen doesn’t know is that our government is attacked on a daily basis by other countries and by terrorists inside our own country with cyber warfare. The U.S. government has been building a team over the years of people that are extremely knowledgeable in the area of cyberspace and cyber warfare.

The Pentagon is looking to put forth a new strategic military plan so that the armed forces will be prepared to begin offensive and defensive computer warfare in cyberspace. In an article titled Pentagon Plans New Arm to Wage Cyberspace Wars David Sanger wrote, “Mr. Obama, officials said, will announce the creation of a White House office that will coordinate a multibillion-dollar effort to restrict access to government computers and protect systems that run the stock exchanges, clear global banking transactions and manage the air traffic control system.” The hopes with the new White House office, is that it will become more aware of the thousands of cyber attacks against the United States.

It is yet undecided whether the National Security Agency or the new military command will team up together or only one of them will be assigned to the duty of offensive cyber operations. Sanger wrote, "It is a recognition that the United States already has a growing number of computer weapons in its arsenal and must prepare strategies for their use — as a deterrent or alongside conventional weapons — in a wide variety of possible future conflicts.” In 1998, to prevent the U.S. and Nato planes from being attacked the U.S. hacked into the Serbian Air traffic control and deterred the Serbian planes from attacking our own.

One half of the cyber attacks originate from inside the U.S. It has been said that cyber war games are available to various age ranges and when playing them it is like being in a real battlefield situation. So who is to say that when some of those kids get older and more intelligent, some might get really upset with the government and take their knowledge of cyber warfare and try to use it on the U.S. government. Other attacks on the cyber world of our government are from foreign countries trying to terrorize our government. If the new White House office helps prevent these attacks from happening I am all for it. We need to keep our government safe from these attacks so that the citizens of the United States can be safe.