Ring Ring Boom: A Paradigm Shift for Cyber Warfare

Israel just pulled off an extremely sophisticated attack against Hezbollah using exploding personal devices. At least 20 people are dead and 450 injured. Details are here. I want to focus on the implications for future cyber warfare.

Initial reports called it a cyber attack, but after reviewing the CCTV footage of the initial pager explosions, it was obvious that there must have been explosives placed inside the devices and remotely detonated. I wouldn’t classify this a cyber attack, just like the Taliban calling a phone number and blowing up an IED is not a cyber attack. However, it does have serious implications for the future of cyber warfare. Israel has just opened a new frontier: your personal devices can be weaponised to cause physical harm to you or your loved ones.

We knew already that devices aren’t safe, they can be hacked, everyone knows this. But nobody expects them to explode in your hand and literally kill you. The world is now acutely aware that their devices have the potential to maim or kill them, if they are an enemy of whoever controls them. Again, this attack was not actually a cyber attack, but the point is that they have released the genie from the bottle and now the tactic to inflict physical harm with your own technology is on the table.

As we move toward a more complex and integrated world filled with IoT devices, robots and automated vehicles, the potential for such threats will only grow. In this case, it was a pager or walkie talkie, which can’t cause much harm on its own, hence why they needed to stuff it with explosives. But imagine a future when we have household robots or automated vehicles, these can potentially be hacked to cause physical harm to the person they belong to. It’s known that the US Government likely already has the capability to hack into vehicle electronics to take control of them. Although it seems far fetched, these are very real possibilities. To put it succinctly: There was a fear of what could happen on the device, but now there is a fear of the device itself. This is the paradigm shift.

How has this event impacted the world? There are two perspectives I will address: the governments and the people. Governments will need to pay close attention to the devices they use and where they are sourced from. In the short term, this is a concern only for Israel’s enemies, but over time it will become global issue. We will likely see heightened physical security around manufacturers and a closer oversight of supply chains. Likely, governments will want to have a chain of custody, evidence that a device manufactured in country A, transferred via country B, and sold in country C, has not been tampered with along the way. This is difficult to keep track of, so governments will probably seek to create devices that they use within their own borders wherever possible. Russia and China were already moving in this direction anyway, no doubt recent events will simply accelerate this initiative.

As for normal people, there is a psychological impact. Our personal devices are deeply personal, especially our phones. They are almost a part of our being, an extension of ourselves, always within reach and deeply integrated into our lives. Now, people will be asking the question “can my personal device kill me?”. This was a question that never had to even be considered before. The answer, unfortunately, no matter how slim the chances are, is yes. Perhaps this event will fade from memory, but I predict that these device-based attacks will only increase going forward and become an integral part of future warfare. The problem is it’s not just soldiers or terrorists that use personal devices, it’s all of us.

It’s fascinating how like players in a game, we have an idea of the rulebook, a list of acceptable ‘moves’ that can be made. At one point, ransomware wasn’t part of the game, nobody thought about it. Then someone made that move for the first time, and now it’s part of the rulebook that we have to react to. In the same way, using physical devices to cause physical harm wasn’t a move in the game, and so it was unthinkable. But now, Israel has made that move, forcing it into the rulebook, and now we all have to acknowledge it as part of the game going forward.