 |
 |
 |
|
10.28.08 Twitter Tech Is Handy For Terrorists  By Dan MorrillIn addition, we are not just talking about threatening people over twitter either. A draft US Army report thinks that Twitter could become a terrorist's best friend. While technology like on line video, forums, web sites, and other locations on the internet have been used by terrorists for terrorists, the addition of Twitter to the handy check list of terrorists tools brings about the entire idea of the use or misuse of Web 2.0. So far, the military has identified just about every kind of technology as being handy for terrorists. What works for people, like fun games like Halo, could also be used to train terrorists. What we use to coordinate business can also be used to coordinate acts of terrorism. They can also be used for bullying as much as MySpace, SMS, the phone, notes on a door, post it pad notes, stickers, or a whole host of other technology that is available to us. This boils down to a risk management issue, and while the military has to think of these kinds of scenarios, they are not too far off the mark with some of their assertions, web 2.0 technology has been weaponized ala some Facebook applications that delivered malware to the user. The entire computer platform in one form or another, regardless of operating system has been weaponized for just about any purpose but what the user really wants to have happen. The use of new communications channels like twitter, Jaiku, Pownce, and others to coordinate movements of groups or people is something that twitter is used for a lot. If you want to hook up with friends in town, you tweet them to see if they are available. If you are old fashioned you might call or text them.
Every technology we have today could be handy for anyone intent on misusing the technology. The problem is going to come along if we start thinking that everything we do developing brand new communication tools are going to be immediately co-opted by terrorists, or big crime, or little crime. It seems at times that we are forgetting the full benefits that it also provides to the other group of people who will use the tools for doing good, coordinating business, sales, marketing, and other things that we use Web 2.0 to do. The sad part is that this is also the kind of thinking that we have to do with technology, not just how it can be used, but how it can be misused. Information Security folks do this all the time with various forms of technology, from Weaponizing the latest operating system flaw, to Weaponizing a Facebook application. The curious part is that while the line of thinking is legitimate, how will we be able to monitor all those channels of communication to make sure that they are not being used to deliver malware, or coordinates to a group of people with a truck bomb? It is not so much the technology itself; it is how that technology is used. We have in many ways accepted both the good and the bad with technology. Availability and access, ability of those tools for misuse, and for good use for technology is what risk management is about. While the tweet of death has yet to surface, the way that twitter can be used to coordinate flash mobs is known. The real question along the way is how are we who develop and use those tools going to work out ways to monitor the use of those tools for malware or activity that could be dangerous. From the risk management perspective, how we monitor the use of those tools in the company, or in government will be just as important as to how we use them. The real question is though, as those tools expand, and people start using them more and more, to find that one person who is doing a tweet of death, how do we pull them out of the general background noise before the event, and not after as is so often the case. Comments About the Author: Dan Morrill has been in the information security field for 18 years, both civilian and military, and is currently working on his Doctor of Management. Dan shares his insights on the important security issues of today through his blog, Managing Intellectual Property & IT Security, and is an active participant in the ITtoolbox blogging community. |
|||||||
|
| ||
|
-- ITProNews is an iEntry,
Inc. publication -- iEntry, Inc. 2549 Richmond Rd. Lexington KY, 40509 ©2008 iEntry, Inc. All Rights Reserved Privacy Policy Legal archives | advertising info | news headlines | free newsletters | comments/feedback | submit article |
