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INFORMATION Technology
a new age of mechanised warfare
Information is the most powerful weapon of our age, it defines the direction of public opinion, makes or breaks political careers, and plays an increasingly central role in everyday life. Unsurprisingly, the threat of information has spawned an entirely new category of warfare, with China at it’s media epicentre. The threat of cyber-terrorism is often dramatised in the western media to justify continued hostility against advanced cyber countries, which China is rapidly becoming. However, this should not detract from the very real impact of cyber-terrorism on the lives of citizens — not just politicians — the world over.
A New Age of Mechanised Warfare
June 3, 2016
Hacking personal identities is just the tip of an entire underground network able to operate outside and above the law. Cyber militias, like those targeting the United States and growing up in border countries around Russia — arguably the world’s first and second-most advanced cyber states — are becoming increasingly sophisticated in their attacks on centres of commerce and internet infrastructure.
In China, the extent of internet penetration means that 45% of it’s 1.4 billion citizens active online are vulnerable to cyber attacks. There are nearly 700 million accounts run by WeChat, the Tencent internet giant’s most pervasive instant chat technology. WeChat Wallet is becoming increasingly prevalent in everyday life, used for everything from restaurant bills to services payments. In order to use WeChat Wallet, a customer must verify their identity and bank details, which are then encrypted using a series of complex algorithms.
With the continued advancement of computing power, however, these algorithms are becoming increasingly less difficult to crack. This is where the need for quantum communications comes in.
China is set to launch the world’s first quantum communications satellite, creating a large-scale “uncrackable” data infrastructure. The communication line, which stretches over 2000 kilometres between Shanghai and Beijing, uses optical fibre to transmit data via quantum particles, such as polarised photons.
A message which is encrypted using quantum particles cannot be effectively “copied”, as the act of copying the encryption code changes the nature of both the photons carrying the code and the information itself, which could result in the destruction of the information transmission.
China is set to launch the world’s first quantum communications satellite, creating a large-scale “uncrackable” data infrastructure, stretching over 2000 kilometres between Shanghai and Beijing, uses optical fibre to transmit data via quantum particles.
It is the high-tech version of Dan Brown’s “Cryptex”, a device that destroys the information contained on a scroll of papyrus if the correct password is not known. Quantum encryptions cannot be accessed by force,like a cryptex; however, unlike a cryptex, quantum encryptions cannot be accessed by simply solving the encryption or finding out the password as a third-party eavesdropper.
Such developments speak to the rising threat of cyber-terrorism, and the risk it poses to regular citizens. China’s plans to establish a nation-wide quantum communications network, and an international network by 2030, demonstrate the need to protect internet users in a more comprehensive way. As internet-based information technologies develop, the methods used to protect information must step up to the new task.
Just as lock-and-key methods of protecting financial assets in the last century have been replaced by digitalisation and encryption, so must encryption methods be replaced by an alternative relevant to the times. The world’s cyber giants know this, and are understandably uncomfortable with China’s advancement in the area of quantum communications and its capacity to launch cyber-counterattacks without fear of reprisals.
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