Sarah Zheng
There’s something worse than a spy balloon. But first…
Look to the skies
Mysterious balloons hovering ominously over parts of North America are understandably causing some panic. If Taiwan is any indication, these sightings are happening around the globe.
Taiwan has spotted dozens of these sorts of balloons — suspected Chinese military aircraft — in its airspace in recent years, the Financial Times reported. After the US shot down four balloons, a Taiwanese Defense spokesperson said Taipei might do the same if it were concerned enough about them.
What could be more frightening than a big, white spy balloon suspended overhead? The answer, recent moves by Taiwan suggest, is malicious Chinese hackers.
Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen unveiled a new national cybersecurity research institute on Friday. “Information security is national security,” she declared.
China has long used Taiwan as a testing ground for its cyber capabilities, but Tsai’s administration began to take the threat more seriously last year after hackers pulled off an elaborate attack. The hack coincided with a visit by then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. The California representative was the highest-ranking US official to visit Taiwan in a quarter-century.
China apparently took the trip as a provocation and rattled its saber. Cyberattacks on Taiwanese government units set a new daily record, which was 23 times greater than the previous one. At the same time, 7-Eleven stores on the island were hacked to display the message, “Get out of Taiwan.” Beijing has rejected accusations that it sponsored the hacks.
When I made my own (far less consequential) visit to Taiwan during local elections last November, analysts there told me that Pelosi’s visit was a cyber wake-up call. Some of the tactics weren’t particularly sophisticated, but they were effective. The hacks sent a clear message about weaknesses in Taiwan’s cyber defenses.
“For an ordinary person, you walk to the convenience store and see it’s been defaced, and then you walk into the high-speed rail station and see defacement messages,” said Silvia Yeh, an analyst at the research firm TeamT5. “Then you go online and see that you can’t access Taiwan’s presidential website. Their first impression would be that China’s capabilities are so strong, and our internal systems have already been compromised.”
There were also accompanying disinformation campaigns. Doublethink Lab, a Taipei-based organization tracking such actions, documented 2,900 instances of disinformation targeting Taiwan in the months between Pelosi’s visit and the November elections.
“Perception warfare is a very, very important part of China’s whole strategy,” said Min Hsuan Wu, the head of Doublethink.
Taiwan’s government responded by establishing a cabinet-level digital ministry, under which the new cyber institute sits, and officials have taken steps to cultivate more cyber talent and institute heavier fines for corporate data breaches.
At least 37 US lawmakers visited Taiwan last year, according to Bloomberg data, and the trend will continue this year. House Foreign Affairs Chairman Michael McCaul said last week that he’ll lead a bipartisan congressional delegation to the island in the spring, and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has said he intends to make his own trip.
Beijing will probably employ more cyber tactics against Taiwan, particularly ahead of the presidential election in January next year. Analysts fear possible escalations from those that took place during the Pelosi visit — the sorts that could cause power outages, for example. That prospect is a lot scarier than a balloon.
No comments:
Post a Comment