The Internet vulnerability is almost as big a threat as an EMP

From what I know a determined enemy would not have great difficulty in taking down the whole Internet. It probably could even be done by a well trained coordinated terrorist group. I have come to the conclusion that any website or any target can be brought down fairly easily. To bring down the whole system would just take a larger more sophisticated effort and that is very likely in a war.

We need to realize that the Internet is not reliable or secure and we should not be controlling our critical infrastructures and just-in-time-inventories solely relying on the Internet as it is designed now. One of these days we are going to wake up and the whole Internet system will be down and it is not going to come back up anytime soon. Then what is the back up plan? Going back to the 50’s without inventories or electronics? How will you even get your money out of the bank? Try buying something at a store with a charge card when the Internet is down.

The Internet needs to be completely redesigned from the ground up making security the primary issue. Either that or just use the internet for fun and games and information but don’t ever think it will be there for corporations, finance and government to communicate after a sophisticated attack by an enemy. Like the EMP threat our society is betting it’s whole future on access to those 1’s and 0’s. There is no access to those databases of 1’s and 0’s if the electricity is out or communications between electronic devices are no longer there.

Revealed: The Internet’s Biggest Security Hole | Threat Level from Wired.com

Two security researchers have demonstrated a new technique to stealthily intercept internet traffic on a scale previously presumed to be unavailable to anyone outside of intelligence agencies like the National Security Agency.

The tactic exploits the internet routing protocol BGP (Border Gateway Protocol) to let an attacker surreptitiously monitor unencrypted internet traffic anywhere in the world, and even modify it before it reaches its destination.

The demonstration is only the latest attack to highlight fundamental security weaknesses in some of the internet’s core protocols. Those protocols were largely developed in the 1970s with the assumption that every node on the then-nascent network would be trustworthy. The world was reminded of the quaintness of that assumption in July, when researcher Dan Kaminsky disclosed a serious vulnerability in the DNS system. Experts say the new demonstration targets a potentially larger weakness.

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