The Arab Spring continues to provide excellent case studies of what RAND researchers John Arquilla and David Ronfeldt refer to as “netwar,” low-intensity conflicts involving leaderless networks of actors. The resiliency and robustness of the network form was put to the test last year when the Mubarak regime attempted to disrupt opposition forces by turning off the internet in Egypt. To overcome this challenge, opposition activists adopted low tech alternatives (e.g. radios) and ingenious uses of hybrid technologies (e.g. Google Voice) to remain connected to one another as well as connected to the world outside of Egypt. Today, opposition forces in Syria face attacks on their networks, but the primary threat this time around is not disruption, but infiltration.
The CNN article “Computer spyware is newest weapon in Syrian conflict,” showcases a network infiltration tactic that Assad loyalists are using against opposition activists.[1] Loyalists, posing as activists online, have been distributing malware disguised as security software to activist networks. The software is distributed on the pretenses of preventing security forces from compromising communications. However, once the software is loaded, it discretely “steals passwords and system information, downloads new programs, guides internal processes, logs keystrokes and takes shots with the webcam” and then forwards the data to a “server at a government-owned telecommunications company in Syria.”
The distribution of this malware, called “backdoor.breut,” appears to be part of a targeted cyberespionage campaign. In one instance, a former aid worker named “Susan” received the malware via Skype conversation with someone she thought was a fellow activist. Susan would later discover that her Facebook and email login credentials were compromised and that the activist she spoke to was a pro-Assad imposter: the actual activist had been in detention at the time, according to other regime opponents. Susan’s stolen online credentials are likely to be used to further penetrate activist networks. Someone posing as Susan, a former aid worker, could arrange a secret interview with opposition forces desperate to get their message out to the West. That secret interview could in fact be a trap laid by security forces.
For years, now, Western think-tanks and non-profit NGOs have been equipping Arab prodemocracy activists with the social-media savvy and technological know-how required to withstand security crackdowns and internet blackouts.[2] If those same Western interests want the prodemocracy networks of the Arab Spring to continue to prevail, then they must provide the training and resources to secure not just the network, but the individual nodes. Even a robust and resilient network will not last if it can be infiltrated one node at a time. A guerilla network is only as secure as its least secure network guerilla. Fortunately, even the crudest of information security methods (e.g. running key ciphers, out-of-band authentication) can make an infiltration campaign prohibitively expensive to the attacker. The challenge going forward will be to find ways to reconcile the network guerilla’s information security requirements with social media’s necessary promiscuity. If such a thing is possible, it will surely evolve out of the Arab Spring.
[1] Brumfield, Ben. “Computer spyware is newest weapon in Syrian conflict.” CNN.com. Accessed 2/26/2012. [http://www.cnn.com/2012/02/17/tech/web/computer-virus-syria/index.html?hpt=hp_t2]
[2] Nixon, Ron. “U.S. Groups Helped Nurture Arab Uprisings.” NYTimes.com. Accessed 2/26/2012. [http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/15/world/15aid.html?_r=3&hp]
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