CIAO Focus, January 2013: Issues in International Cybersecurity

Cyberspace has become an important arena of world politics. Cybersecurity has political, security and economic dimensions which further blur the concept of conflict; perpetual (cyber) conflict could become the norm. The digital world has become a domain where strategic advantage can be won or lost, the latter being more likely without serious indigenous cyber capabilities. In short, every modern country in the world is creating cyber capabilities, with the result that the global military security landscape has not changed as dramatically since the advent of nuclear weapons.

Cyber capabilities will soon be essential for nationstates and armed forces that want to be treated like credible players. Due to its exposure and interests, the United States is currently at the forefront of conceptual, ethical and political discussions about cybersecurity. Having spent at least a decade integrating the cyber world into its security and military thinking, it has also taken the lead in using cyber attacks as a tool of foreign and security policy, thereby placing it far ahead of Europe, where discussion about offensive cyber capabilities, for example, is hushed in many countries. Most European countries have cyber strategies on paper, but public discussion and practical measures at policy and doctrinal levels are not as mature as they are in the United States.

--Finnish Institute for International Affairs

 

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