Even Heads of State Vulnerable to Subversion, Cyber Expert Warns

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Harel Menashri, head of cyber at the Holon Institute of Technology. Photo: Gilad Kavalerchik

 

 

In today's interconnected world, hostile actors have the ability to manipulate not only average citizens but also high-level officials, warns Israeli cyber expert Harel Menashri. He says influence operations by such countries as Russia, China and Iran pose a significant threat

Information warfare is certainly not a new phenomenon but it has evolved into a much graver threat in the cyber era.

Hostile actors are using the internet to reach out, plant thoughts and make people act against their own best interests. And in today's world, by influencing people it is possible to manipulate political parties, prime ministers and presidents, a senior Israeli cyber expert said on January 29 at the Cybertech Global 2020 conference.  

"We know some operations of China and Iran but we believe the way Russia deals with this area is totally different than other countries," said Harel Menashri, head of cyber at the Holon Institute of Technology, who served for 36 years as part of the Israeli security system and was one of the creators of the cyber policy of the country's defense establishment.

"The way that Russia deals with information warfare is totally different than in the West. In Russia, cyber is under information warfare," said Menashri, who worked for the Israel Security Agency for 25 years.

Russia's way of thinking and behavior can be traced back to the early part of the 20th century, immediately after the communist revolution, he said, pointing out that the head of German communist party at that time told Lenin to use liberals in the West rather than attack them.

In this methodology, if you plant a kernel of knowledge about something in people's minds, "they go to the street and do your work for you without understanding that what they are doing is against their will, but they do it because they think it's good for them," he said.

For example, we know that the Kremlin was behind the strikes in the 1980s by the British Labor Party and the Greens against the US setup of bases in Great Britain, said Menashri.

In addition, Menashri said that while he was researching the Russian influence before the last election in the US, it was found that in 2012 Russia started to try to cause rifts in American society. Also, a year and a half ago, Johns Hopkins University showed how Russia spread data about fake research on vaccinations, claiming they were dangerous and that children got sick or died. People believed it because the document was written in an academic way with statistics claiming to show how it happened, according to the cyber expert.

Menashri quoted Valery Gerasimov, chief of Russia's General Staff, as saying in a 2013 interview that sometimes or even most of the time, information warfare is better than using artillery because by planting an idea in people's minds you can make them go out and do what you want them to do, and they don't understand it's against their own interest.

If you can move people, you can make political parties, prime ministers and presidents do what you want them to do, Menashri said.  

Russia is not the only country using influence and fake data, he pointed out, citing operations by China, Iran and other countries in recent years. "It's going to be more and more difficult to find the truth in this area," he said.