

Do We Need a New Pottery Barn Rule for Cyberwarfare? - olalonde
http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2012/06/do-we-need-a-new-pottery-barn-rule-for-cyberwarfare.html

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opiumden
1\. I thought I read that Flame was well targeted and had command and control
systems to make sure it hadn't "violated the computers and networks of
<i>countless</i> numbers of people and companies". I could be wrong but Flame
isn't the latest botnet zombie creator spitting out $largeNumber of infections
a second, it's more subtle than that.

2\. The Pottery Barn Rule may be A Good Thing(tm), maybe not. But it's pretty
clear that (for better or worse, I don't want to debate the politics) the US
government has no intention of following The Pottery Barn Rule when it comes
to foreign policy decisions regarding the Iraq and Afghan conflicts. It's a
rather weak premise to base your argument for a new rule on a past rule that's
ineffective because the power in question ignores it.

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Zimahl
I don't know about your first point, but the problem with the US Government
and the conflicts we as a nation have entangled ourselves in over the last
decade+ is that we can't even be bothered to even do the basic due diligence
before jumping in.

Fundamentally, we ignored even the simplest tenets of 'The Art of War'. It's
actually painful to read this after the fact. Powell knew this stuff and at
it's core, the Pottery Barn principle is a couple of those AoW tenets boiled
down into something everyone can understand.

In the end, if you can't even follow the sage advice that has been proved
countless times over the last couple thousands of years, you've got bigger
problems.

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xcallmejudasx
This wouldn't work though. The government is immune(or at least heavily
protected) against things like class action lawsuits for this very reason.
Unless we can get past this giant political and bureaucratic hurdle we won't
be able to do much except throw money into our own security. Even then, how is
the best persona/corporate security schemes and policies going to withstand
something developed by the brightest mathematicians and security experts money
can buy?

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neutronicus
...if Flame contaminates my computer, the US government "owns" it? Rather poor
choice of words.

