Cyber Operations

1Cyber Operations

1.1 Cyber Operations Introduction

Cyber operations include the collection of data. This collecting of information is an enduring activity that existed long before cyber (Crumpton, 2012). However, with the advent of networked persistent memory devices (e.g., personal computers, and iPhones), using technology to access “end points” and exploit resident data became both a viable alternative to conventional spying and a new, usable tradecraft.

1.1.1 Cyber – A 21^st‐Century Collection Channel

One of the key issues inspiring the recent increase in the use of cyber, as a collection channel, is the volume of information that can be collected by cyber means. For example, a Cold War spy’s ability to move information, even with the most advanced collection and data transfer techniques, likely peaked on the order of kilobytes, megabytes at best, of information transfer. With the current capacity of cyber storage and communication, however, terabyte downloads are common for commercial attacks (Warner, 2017).

Cyber provides a geometric increase in data transfer. In addition, the comprehensive collection provides the cyberattacker with the ability to distill the current situation, frame the desired effects, and perform cyber operations in order to produce the desired effects without traveling to the event location. The amount of data collected, and remediation cost due to a cyberattack, can be significant (Figure 1.1).

As shown in Figure 1.1, cyberattacks are increasing ...