References
97
Among such rivals, UK looks rather modest: it has just over 2 thousand hackers
with a budget of 450 million US dollars.
As for North Korea, expert estimates vary: from 700 to 6000 hackers with a budget
of 400–900 million US dollars.
Russia lags behind with no more than 1000 specialists and an annual budget
of 300 million US dollars. Indirectly, the Russian media confirm these data. For
instance, back in January 2017, the Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation
Sergey Shoygu officially confirmed the creation of special cyberunits within the
Russian Defense Ministry. The existence of such active cyberunits is evidenced by
the fact that back in 2013, during the Belarusian-Russian military training exercises
(Zapad-2013), one of such units of the “potential aggressor” modeled the situation
of a large-scale cyberattack on information and control resources of the “defending
party.” At the same time, another unit “successfully repelled a training cyberattack,
which was as close as possible to real combat conditions.”
As for Belarus, it is a known fact that in 2013, the Ministry of Defense of the
Republic of Belarus announced the recruitment of civilian specialists in the field of
IT, and in early 2018, the newly created special IT units were staffed with experts
from Belarus High Technologies Park.
The individual constituent components of cyberweapons are further divided into
the following groups: defensive, offensive, and combined. It is worth noting that cryptographic protection, antivirus protection, means of detecting (preventing) unauthorized intrusions (attacks), etc. were previously considered as one of the important
elements of ensuring information security and countering unauthorized access of
some violators (hackers).
It is a known fact that governments of all developed industrial countries have
imposed a secret veto on publication of key technical aspects of concepts and
prospects for further development in all publicly available science and technology
periodicals. This can be partly explained by the ongoing information warfare between
the East and the West with the participation of the leading world powers (“white
powder” in Iraq, Berezovsky, Litvinenko, Skripal “cases,” “Russian interference in
the US presidential elections,” fake chemical attacks in Syria, etc.).
The technical aspects of developing effective methods to counter the introduction
of hardware Trojans into the microcircuits have been vetoed, too.
At the same time, military departments of the world’s leading powers, who are
aware of the real state of affairs and possible unique prospects for the development
of this direction, sufficiently finance a number of individual projects and special
comprehensive programs.
To achieve these goals, intelligence agencies possess numerous technical and software tools and “accessories” for establishing covert technical channels of classified
information leakage. The so-called human factor, i.e., active use of infiltrators and
“reliable agents” (detractors) plays an important role.
Before turning to the main research topic (hardware Trojans in microcircuits), it
seems reasonable to consider various types of malicious logic (Trojans, backdoors,
spyware) that were the “predecessors” of hardware Trojans in microcircuits and
adopted some of their “malicious” properties and methods.
97
Among such rivals, UK looks rather modest: it has just over 2 thousand hackers
with a budget of 450 million US dollars.
As for North Korea, expert estimates vary: from 700 to 6000 hackers with a budget
of 400–900 million US dollars.
Russia lags behind with no more than 1000 specialists and an annual budget
of 300 million US dollars. Indirectly, the Russian media confirm these data. For
instance, back in January 2017, the Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation
Sergey Shoygu officially confirmed the creation of special cyberunits within the
Russian Defense Ministry. The existence of such active cyberunits is evidenced by
the fact that back in 2013, during the Belarusian-Russian military training exercises
(Zapad-2013), one of such units of the “potential aggressor” modeled the situation
of a large-scale cyberattack on information and control resources of the “defending
party.” At the same time, another unit “successfully repelled a training cyberattack,
which was as close as possible to real combat conditions.”
As for Belarus, it is a known fact that in 2013, the Ministry of Defense of the
Republic of Belarus announced the recruitment of civilian specialists in the field of
IT, and in early 2018, the newly created special IT units were staffed with experts
from Belarus High Technologies Park.
The individual constituent components of cyberweapons are further divided into
the following groups: defensive, offensive, and combined. It is worth noting that cryptographic protection, antivirus protection, means of detecting (preventing) unauthorized intrusions (attacks), etc. were previously considered as one of the important
elements of ensuring information security and countering unauthorized access of
some violators (hackers).
It is a known fact that governments of all developed industrial countries have
imposed a secret veto on publication of key technical aspects of concepts and
prospects for further development in all publicly available science and technology
periodicals. This can be partly explained by the ongoing information warfare between
the East and the West with the participation of the leading world powers (“white
powder” in Iraq, Berezovsky, Litvinenko, Skripal “cases,” “Russian interference in
the US presidential elections,” fake chemical attacks in Syria, etc.).
The technical aspects of developing effective methods to counter the introduction
of hardware Trojans into the microcircuits have been vetoed, too.
At the same time, military departments of the world’s leading powers, who are
aware of the real state of affairs and possible unique prospects for the development
of this direction, sufficiently finance a number of individual projects and special
comprehensive programs.
To achieve these goals, intelligence agencies possess numerous technical and software tools and “accessories” for establishing covert technical channels of classified
information leakage. The so-called human factor, i.e., active use of infiltrators and
“reliable agents” (detractors) plays an important role.
Before turning to the main research topic (hardware Trojans in microcircuits), it
seems reasonable to consider various types of malicious logic (Trojans, backdoors,
spyware) that were the “predecessors” of hardware Trojans in microcircuits and
adopted some of their “malicious” properties and methods.