Cyber conflict
The cyber landscape is echoing to the sounds of sabres being rattled, as President Biden vows that Russia will pay a price for interference in the 2020 US election, and the UK says cyber attacks could be met with nuclear retaliation.
On Tuesday, the US released a declassified intelligence report accusing Russia of carrying out "influence operations" designed to damage Joe Biden's chances of victory. The report also accused Iran of trying to damage the Trump campaign, but it added that neither action compromised the election process. Intriguingly, the report says China didn't interfere in the election, although it is accused of considering whether to try to influence the outcome. Of course, that may be because it was too busy hacking Exchange email servers around the world.
The extent of incidents like these make the UK's integrated review all the more alarming. In an abrupt departure from previous policy, it edged towards the idea that nuclear weapons could be used to retaliate against cyber attacks. We have long argued that cyber weapons have the potential to be at least as damaging as nuclear missiles but, despite that, there is no international convention to govern their use. The UK's apparent decision to create equivalence between them underlines the need for the international community to address the issue. Or, as the founding head of the UK National Cyber Security Centre, tweeted, "I hope we’re not moving towards an era of mushroom cloud computing".