Resisting Foreign Internet Attacks

Ben Arnoldy, Christian Science Monitor

^{Internet attacks on
Georgia expose a key flaw for more than 100 nations.}

As Georgian troops retreated to defend their capital from
Russian attack, the websites of their government, also under fire, retreated to
Google.

In an Internet first, Georgia's Ministry of Foreign
Affairs reopened its site on Google's free Blogger network and gave reporters a
Gmail address to reach the National Security Council.

The attacks have deluged the websites of the president,
various ministries, and news agencies with bogus traffic. The jam not only shut
down those sites but also clogged Georgia's Internet access, exposing
its reliance on Russian Internet pipelines. ...

"The lesson here for Washington
is that any modern conflict will include a cyberwarfare component, simply
because it's too inexpensive to be passed up," says Bill Woodcock,
research director at Packet Clearing House, a nonprofit Internet research
institute in San Francisco.
"The best [defensive] strategy is always preparedness. We've spent eight
years completely ignoring that, while the Chinese and Indian governments have
been paying really close attention and investing many tens of billions of
dollars."

Georgia's
Internet infrastructure has two big weaknesses. First, most of its external
connections go through Russia.
Second, there's a lack of internal connections called Internet exchange points.
So when a Web surfer in Georgia calls up a Georgian Web page, that request
routes through another country, which is similar to driving to Mexico to get
across town in San Francisco, says Mr. Woodcock, whose organization helps
countries build their own Internet exchange points.