Tag Archive for: ASIO

Former ASIO boss warns on energy sector cyber


Energy experts and a former ASIO chief have warned that Australia’s critical energy infrastructure was growing in complexity and vulnerability to cyber-attacks, but a commensurate uplift in resilience has not occurred.

Former ASIO director general and current chair of the Foreign Investment Review Board David Irvine said energy was one of many Australian sectors lacking sufficient cyber resilience, and that most local organisations are not “caring enough” about the new “tool of warfare”.

Progress is being made but not quickly enough, and Australia is vulnerable to sophisticated cyber attacks, Mr Irvine told an Australia Israel Chamber of Commerce Business lunch on Friday.

“Nation states are busily working on what we call hybrid warfare; the ability, without actually shooting people, to bring opposing states to their knees.”

Former ASIO director general and current chair of the Foreign Investment Review Board David Irvine

Russia has already deployed hybrid warfare against several countries in Europe, and the tactic now poses a serious threat to Australia, according to the former ASIO boss.

“This is now a threat that is on our horizon, and we really need to work hard because, as I keep saying, the wars of the 21st century are going to be fought in cyberspace before a kinetic shot is fired.”

Those same cyber warfare tools are also increasingly popular weapons for criminal attackers, Mr Irvine said, but Australian industry and governments have been slow to prepare for attacks and how they will respond.

“As a nation, we have to have responses,” he said.  “And we have been, as a nation, very slow to come to the understanding of those needs for responses.”

Mr Irvine said boards now understand the threat of cyber-attacks, much more than they did in 2009 when he worked as ASIO chief, but most are still “grappling” with how to handle an attack.

Governments, too, have improved their cyber posture but more needs to be done, according to Mr Irvine, who is also a non-executive director of the Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre.

He said the Department of Home Affairs’ Critical Infrastructure Centre had asked the Foreign Investment…

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Australia’s $1.3 billion ASIO spend signals a ‘grey zone’ war with China


Australia’s future is getting decidedly spooky. China is engaging in influence and interference attacks on our way of life. Now we’re investing billions of dollars into returning the favour.

Tucked away in a quiet corner of the federal budget was an unexpectedly large number: $1.3 billion.

Alongside were ominous names: ASIO and Signals Directorate.

And the reason was vague: Technological capabilities.

Little else was said. It is, after all, the very heart of Australia’s international espionage operations.

But Flinders University lecturer in international relations, Dr Michael Sullivan, told news.com.au the clues are in Canberra’s strategic, diplomatic and domestic posturing.

“Improved technical capabilities is the wording in the budget papers,” he says.

“That relates clearly to expanded and upgraded ‘grey zone’ activities. And that means both offensive and defensive.”

The grey zone is the murky space between international law and war. It’s where plausible deniability is at play. It’s where confusion reigns supreme.

RELATED: Warship on the move amid China tensions

Evidence of this activity is everywhere.

There is an ongoing attack on US fuel supply pipelines. The blackout of an Indian city during its border dispute with China. Data thefts from Parliament House, universities and businesses.

And that’s barely even a taste.

Avast cybersecurity expert Stephen Kho says the $1.3 billion figure may sound like a significant amount. But once spread over its 10-year term, it is relatively modest compared to our Five Eyes international intelligence-sharing partners (the US, Britain, Canada and New Zealand).

“This investment is definitely a step in the right direction,” the antivirus and digital security provider adds, saying benefits from this and related cybersecurity projects will “funnel down from national security to everyday consumer security”.

Dr Sullivan says Australia already has its own established digital grey zone capabilities: “They’re operating every day. They’re focused on – but not limited to – cyber warfare. And their particular focus is the Indo-Pacific”.

It’s just that they’re now getting extra emphasis.

Threat perception

Alongside increased…

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ASIO fights hackers with cyber-warfare fire – The Australian

ASIO fights hackers with cyberwarfare fire
The Australian
ASIO will wield its cyber warfare powers to try to hunt down those responsible for hacking into and dismantling the spy agency's public website yesterday. The activist hacker movement Anonymous has claimed responsibility for the brazen attack, in which

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cyber warfare – read more