The Decay of Reason

LTC Michael Stokes - The Decay of Reason headerThe Decay of Reason?

How Globalization, The Internet, and Social Media Empower Nonstate Actors and Diminish Nation-State Influence

Military Emblem iconLTC Michael Stokes

 

  • Cyberwarfare Officer
  • Instructor at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College
  • Joint doctrine, planning and strategy
  • Cyberwarfare SME
  • Cyber Tactical Operations Center at ARCYBER’s Joint Forces

Headquarters – Cyber

  • Offensive Cyber Operations mission planning and execution
  • Joint Task Force Ares
  • Counter ISIL media operations
  • U.S. Army Cyber Protection Brigade
  • Defensive Cyber operations

War in a Hyper-Connected World

Carl Von Clausewitz portraitCarl Von Clausewitz

Reason

(The Government)

“War is composed of primordial violence,hatred, and enmity, which are to be regarded as a blind natural force; of the play of chance and probability within which the creative spirit is free to roam; and of its element of subordination, as an instrument of policy, which makes it subject to reason” - On War

Reason, Passion, Chance chart                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

INSTRUMENTS OF NATIONAL

POWER

 

Diplomacy

 

Information

 

 

Commonly referred to as DIME

Military

 

Economic

Joint Publication 1, Doctrine for the Armed             

Forces of the United States

NON-STATE ACTORS AND THE CONFLICT IN UKRAINE

THE IT ARMY OF UKRAINE

  • On 26 February, Mykhailo Fedorov, the Ukraine Minister of Digital Transformation tweeted a message calling for IT specialists and hackers to join together to defend Ukraine and fight on the cyber front.
  • The tweet contained a link to a Telegram channel for coordinating tasks. Within hours, channel membership quickly reached over 100k and its at over 300k members now.
  • Task #1 “ We encourage you to use any vectors of cyber and DDoS on these resources.”  followed by a list of 33 organizations and their websites to include

Russian businesses, banks and government offices.

Non-State Actors and the Conflict in Ukraine


The IT Army of Ukraine

  • On26 February, Mykhailo Fedorov, the Ukraine Minister of Digital Transformation tweeted a message calling for IT specialists and hackers to join together to defend Ukraine and fight on the cyber front.
  • The tweet contained a link to a Telegram channel for coordinating tasks. Within hours, channel membership quickly reached over 100k and its at over 300k members now.
  • Task #1 “ We encourage you to use any vectors of cyber and DDoS on these resources.”  followed by a list of 33 organizations and their websites to include

Russian businesses, banks and government offices.

ANONYMOUS

  • The hacktivist collective Anonymous also joined the fray targeting Russian internet service providers, state websites, banks, news agencies and businesses.
  • As of 17 March they’ve claimed to have hacked 2500 websites of Russian and Belarusian organizations.

Russian Charging Station that says “Glory to heroes, Glory to Ukraine!

 

 

 

 

 

CROWDSOURCING INFORMATION

 

Screenshot of the squad303 tool @ https://1920.in

CONTI GROUP

  • Russian Ransomware group first observed in 2020
  • Known for using ransomware to encrypt data on victim networks
  • 400+ observed attacks and collected an estimated $180 million in ransom in 2021
  • CISA, FBI and NSA released a Joint Cybersecurity Advisory about the group in Sep 2021
  • Publicly aligned with Russia on 25th Of February

Announcing “"If anybody will decide to organize a cyberattack or any war activities against Russia, we are going to use all possible resources to strike back at the critical infrastructures of an enemy,“

  • Breached by a Ukrainian hacker who publicly leaked the groups internal communications and hacking tools

CYBER FRONTZ

THE RUSSIAN TROLLS ARE BACK

  • Telegram channel first established on 11 March, now at around 65,000 subscribers
  • “Peoples movement” to defend Russia and counter disinformation and propaganda
  • Modeled after previous Russian “troll farms” like the Internet Research Agency
  • Multiple shifts of 100 paid workers with 200 comment quotas (20k comments per shift)
  • A mix of true named accounts and fake accounts
  • Amplify pro-Kremin videos and articles on popular social media sites like Instagram, YouTube, Facebook and Twitter
  • Also pushing propaganda of bioweapons in Ukraine and Russia ridding Ukraine of Nazis

RISKS

  • Violating Domestic and International Law
  • Compromise Intelligence Collection Operations
  • Could become targets themselves
  • Misattribution
  • Unintended consequences/overly destructive
  • Escalation and reprisals against Western nations

QUESTIONS?