COVID-19 origin – China’s bogeyman! Dragon, full of bile, may trigger cyber-warfare!
TIOL – COB( WEB) – 774 JULY 29, 2021
By Shailendra Kumar, Founder Editor
EVEN as the world has petrifyingly turned into a ‘Delta’ of swingeing infections, origin of COVID-19 continues to be a riddle, mystery and enigma! It also tends to pose a funny paradox of geopolitical ground realities! Though the community of virologists and epidemiologists does admit that tracing back the origin is critical to look into the likelihood of the future pandemics, but a large swathe tends to believe that it is a natural spillover until there is evidence to prove it otherwise. The most accepted theory is that the ‘spongy’ virus jumped from animals to humans at a wet market in Wuhan. But the city is also home to two labs – Might it have sneaked out of one of them?
The WHO has stated that investigations into the lab-leak theory have not been sprawling enough, and a fresh probe may throw light on such a hypothesis. So, WHO officially sought cooperation from China to conduct the second investigation. And China which follows zero tolerance policy towards any spurt in fresh infections (reported 71 fresh cases on Tuesday), seems to have extended the same zero tolerance response to any demand for fresh study. And its politically-tutored boffins loudly uttered that the issue was being politicised after the Biden Administration expressed its hunches about a possible leak from the research lab. They also scoffed at WHO’s lack of respect for common sense and an arrogant attitude towards science. Though the WHO’s Director General has made a fresh appeal for audit of its labs and pertinent data but China sees it as US-pedalled ‘Fraudit’ and favours no change in its recalcitrance towards second phase of probe.
The White House has termed the Chinese blackballing as ‘irresponsible and dangerous’.
Reacting to the WHO’s fresh appeal, the spokesperson of the China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs Zhao Lijian has tweeted: “If labs are to be investigated, the WHO experts should go to Fort Detrick.”
Fort Detrick is a high-tech bio-lab housed at the military base at Maryland in the US.
The issue of fresh WHO study was raised by the US delegation led by the Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman with the Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Li at port city of Tianjin last Monday but, going by the China’s official statements on a raft of bilateral and geopolitical issues, the expressions ‘cooperation’ and ‘transparency’ were conspicuously missing in their diplomatic plate!
The Chinese spokesperson Mr Lijian said that China has asked the US to immediately
“stop interfering in its internal affairs, stop harming its interests, and stop stepping on the red line, stop playing on the fire and stop orchestrating group confrontation under the guise of values”!
For the US, apart from the COVID-19 origin cause célèbre , many global and other issues have riled its bilateral relations with China. Institutionalisation of Quad, a grouping of India, Japan, Australia and the US, has also miffed China in a big way.
What has caused fury in the West are the growing number of cyberattacks on large companies and government organisations from China- sponsored non-State actors. The US, the UK, the EU and NATO have recently warned China on this issue.
Though the latest diplomatic efforts were geared to pave the pathway for a critical Biden and Xi meeting at the G7 Summit in October but their relations are apparently going downhill and geopolitical tensions are mounting. Taiwan figures prominently as the rope in the on-going tug-of- war. China has often violated its air space by sending military planes. America had earlier sent its Naval Warships but has now decided to send more than two dozen F-22 stealth fighters to an exercise in the Western Pacific. They will be deployed at Guam and Tinian Islands for Operation Pacific Iron 2021. Even as such showboating continues and China goes for overt pushback on many issues,
a sort of covert war is already on in the Wild West of cyberspace.
COVID-19, a phiserman’s friend, has proved equally convenient for cyber-bandits from Mainland China. Taiwan is on record that it has faced 20 mn to 40 mn cyberattacks every month during the pandemic from China. Even the FBI in May month admitted that cyber-actors affiliated with China tried to steal COVID-related data and IPR from America. China’s close ally North Korea is known to have gone after cryptocurrency stores. China’s new ally in the Middle East, Iran, is known to have second largest cyber army in the world and they recently targeted American drug makers. Russian ransomware outfits like REvil only recently hacked critical public utility service providers and collected huge amount of ransom from the America entities like Colonia Pipeline and JBS.
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In a nutshell, China which has hugely ramped up its digital infrastructure and also recruited a large army of cyber scientists-cum-indoctrinated- nationalists to work with the cyber command of the PLA, has almost girded its loins to launch a full-fledged cyberwarfare. Or, should one say that the Third World War is going to be fought in the Fifth Domain – Land, Air, Sea & Space being the conventional four!
Although China has significantly enhanced its military might along with aerial prowess and naval strengths coupled with easy-to-launch nuclear warheads but it would first prefer fighting a battle against the US, the NATO, the UK, the EU, Australia, Japan and India in the cyberspace. With the COVID-19 facilitating rapid expansion of digital economy worldwide, China-affiliated cyber-thugs have been busy testing the waters by hacking critical infrastructure and health services in the West.
In 2014, the Obama Administration had indicted five members of China’s armed forces for hacking into American companies. The larger question is – Is the US-led Western Grouping or Quad equally prepared to ward off or ‘defend forward’ in case of more destructive Cyber World War? But why Cyber-war rather than Nuclear or conventional war? It is largely because it
does not promise mutually-assured destruction! Cyber-weapons are cheap
and lend strength to militarily-disadvantaged and weak adversary. Another inherent advantage is – there is a blurred line between criminality and war!
China is, beyond the pale of doubts, fully-prepared to heap ‘cyber explosives’! Its close allies, Russia, North Korea and Iran, are quite adept at launching spine-chilling cyberattacks. They possess proven skills if one goes by a number of incidents in the past 10 years. China has put in place a cyber-warfare doctrine which does not aim at attacking America but disrupting its forces of development and stealing its intellectual property. Not long back, China had cyber-attacked America’s key F-35 defence contractor Lockheed Martin and even Google in 2009. China specialises in stealing high-tech knowhow but not as subtly as Russia does from the West. China and Russia also have highly-trained cyber- hackers to focus on military computer networks which may defuse even missile launch from the NATO! In a war-like scenario, China may unabashedly shut down critical power and gas supply grids, telecom services, water supply pipelines, airport control towers and even speeding vehicles on the road as most of them are today internet-connected!
What about the US? As per the Belfer Centre at Harvard University which evolved a new National Cyber Power Index, America tops the chart. Its cyber-security budget for 2020 was USD 17 billion. A glimpse into its awesome scale of digital espionage was provided to the world by Snowden leaks. Pentagon houses cyber-command centre but its cyber-warfare is believed to be a bit befuddled and secretive. The Biden Administration is now working on a new set of rules for offensive cyber-warfare.
One vulnerable area for America are the private sector software which need to be brought under the ambit of audit by the revamped command centre. President Biden yesterday urged critical private sector companies to enhance their cyber defences.
The White House may soon be the home for a new cyber-warfare Director attached to the President and a new permanent Senate Committee. The realisation has dawned on America that it has to go for a reset of its policies in the cyberspace at the earliest. Mr Biden while addressing the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) yesterday, acknowledged the growing cyber threats from China and Russia.
China is ranked second but is known for its voracious appetite for cyber-espionage. China is also good at camouflaging its real intent. One good instance could be its recent overture to expand its nuclear missile silos but it may be fortifying its cyber capabilities to bite terabytes of pricey Western data! The UK occupies third position. On November 19, 2020, the Boris Johnson Government announced the biggest investment in defence since the Thatcher era. With a budget of 46.5 billion pound, it became the second highest military spender in NATO. The Government also announced that it would set up a new agency for artificial intelligence (AI).
It is committed to enhance nation’s cyber capability in a big way. Russia is ranked fourth and has a large army of dangerous hackers who had allegedly interfered with the US Presidential polls in 2016. The fifth is the Netherlands. Israel is ranked low despite its much-talked about hacking abilities and it is perhaps because of its secrecy. The Western countries do have cyber prowess which may be tested in the new emerging international order. China would prefer responding to the new cold war tantrums, first in the cyber-world and then in other domains.
What about India which is one of the founders of the Quad? Undoubtedly, India has also put in place a command centre in its army intelligence division but it needs to be more aggressively ambitious. With the process of digitalisation of the economy getting hefty nudge from the COVID- 19 and the Digital Mission of the Government, India needs to put in place a forward-looking cyber-warfare command architecture. Ideally, the Prime Minister, Mr Narendra Modi, should first create a dedicated Department of Cyber Policy and Administration by divvying up the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology and also create a Special Secretary-level post in the PMO for all-round coordination with civil as well as military establishments. Indian political leadership needs to realise that India has no choice but to invest oodles of money in the cyber security sector if India has to grow as a confident digital economy worth USD 10 trillion in 10 years.
India cannot forget the scare of a malware in one of its nuclear plants, installed by the North Korean hackers who were looking for a detailed blueprint for their own use! The ISRO has also gone through similar bouts of jitters! Let’s not forget that India is the butt for more than half a million cyberattacks every quater, three-fold rise during the pandemic period and it costs a fortune to repair a system even if hackers fail to steal data. The latest IBM Report underlines that data breaches cost companies an average of over USD four million. In India, it averages about Rs 16.5 Crore in 2021 – a jump of about 18% from 2020. It is high time that the
Union Budget of the Central Government as well as State Governments should annually earmark certain funds for the cyberspace if digital assets are to be protected.
Ideally, the Government should also go for a uniform and standard security protocol for all critical civilian infrastructure and other vital services
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so that India as a Nation is not held to ransom or kneecapped by hostile state actors! In 2019, the Indian banking, financial and insurance sectors spent about USD 500 mn on cyber-security and it may jump to USD 800 mn by next year. India as a whole may spend over USD three billion by 2022. With a crystal-eyed policy in place, all such investments with a foresight may help build towers of impregnable fireballs and also a set of rules to launch counter-offensive in case of a full-fledged cyber-warfare!
The COVID-19 has indeed done both – an incendiary catalyst for the rapid digitalisation of the global economy and also much wider aperture for exposure to cyber-criminals and agents of cyber-warfare! In the eventuality of any sort of cyber-war launched by a country, the frontliners are likely to be civilian organisations – an easy prey to hackers!
The negative perception about China has grown manifold during the pandemic and squirmy Mr Xi has turned into a ‘desperado’ to tee himself up for his place as a major global power alongside the US, the UK and Russia.
At the 100th Anniversary of the CCP on July 1, 2021, Mr Xi indulged in tub-thumping and warned China’s competitors – “will find their heads bashed bloody against a great wall of steel’! Voila! Mr Xi really sounds braggadocious and monstrous to the world, inviting spleen from all quarters! He himself is beleaguered by the unmanageable weight of his own ambitions, political dichotomy in the CCP and the greying population. He is also in fear of rising heft of his own tech companies whose global stocks have completely sunk owing to his crackdown. Profit-making educational companies follow suit as Mr Xi wants to regulate the content by making it non-profit sector – a sign of autocratic governance by the CCP. He also seems to be despaired by his ‘Wolf Warrior’ diplomacy which failed to cash in on the golden era of ‘America First’ Trump and could not win over any of America’s allies to his side! Going by China’s reckless military-cum-foreign policy, world is indeed headed for a period of intense rivalry, acute uncertainty and regionalisation of international trade!
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