Cyberterrorism Essay

What is cyberterrorism and is it a real threat that we should be concerned about? Well first of all According to the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation, cyberterrorism is any "premeditated, politically motivated attack against information, computer systems, computer programs, and data which results in violence against non-combatant targets by sub-national groups or clandestine agents."(FBI, 2010) Unlike a nuisance virus that disrupts service cyberterrorism is designed to cause physical violence or extreme financial harm. Given this, “No act of cyberterrorism has ever yet occurred and is unlikely to at any time in the future,” says, Dr. Maura Conway, a leading expert in international relations.(Conway, 2013 pg. 1) Cyberterrorism is a threat that is exaggerated by the government and media to play on our fears of technology and terrorism, and would be extremely ineffective for extremists to use as an actual attack due to the difficulty of the act and the inability to gain publicity committing the act.

Social-psychological research has shown that things that are unknown usually create anxiety and fear. Most of us don’t have an understanding of the complex systems in today’s technology’s thus creating that fear. When you take the term cyber-terrorism it combines the fears of technology and the fears of terrorism. The government and media understand this and play on those fears by exaggerating the threat of cyberterrorism. By doing this they can get the public support they would need to gain more control over the internet and regulate its use taking away the innovation of the internet and making it more costly to use.

Obama has been pushing for the federal government to take control of the Internet in the US and “If you let the g...

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...ntrol of our military defense and start electronically firing missiles at random targets. These things are just not possible says most cyber-security experts. The truth is that our government is years ahead of the private district in cyber-security and its systems are more than secure.

Our society are becoming more and more reliant on computers to run things for us and as long as computers will be in use their will always be some problems that we will have to deal with. However these cyber threats are more likely to just be cybercrimes and not the cyberterrorism that our government and media have scared us with. The type of cyber-attack to cause the damage that cyberterrorism defines is simply too difficult to do without being detected before it could cause that amount of harm. Cyberterrorism is an exaggerated term that the government uses to control us with fear.