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ISSUES OF ARMENIA'S CYBER SECURITY
Samvel Martirosyan
"Noravank" Foundation
10 July 2008
Year by year Azerbaijan strengthens its positions in the information
front. It is connected with the fact that official Baku has begun
devoting more attention and finances to this issue. In its turn Turkey
traditionally demonstrates the state approach to the very question.
Security of the Armenian segment of internet
It is already the fourth year that the Azerbaijani country has been
waging a war against the Azerbaijani segment of internet. Azerbaijani
hackers are periodically joined by the Turkish ones. Thus, in February
2007 were hacked the sites of the ombudsman, `De Facto' agency and the
one of the National Statistic service under test. The warnings sent to
the site owners have shown that even many hours after what had happened
the fact of hacking was not noticed there. Last summer the Azerbaijanis
made use of the lack of vigilance of the Armenian provider `Web' and
took control over tens of Armenian sites, including the internet
projects of `Mediamax' agency hosted in the company's server. During
several months the company didn't correct its inadvertence, and accused
the site owners of what had happened. As a matter of fact it turned out
that the state structures responsible for the security didn't interfere
in the situation and only constant complains finally made the company
solve the problems in the server's security system. In the meantime the
Azerbaijanis are still satisfied with hacking sites or uploading
anti-Armenian information. However, if we take into consideration that
the owners of such important sites don't notice the fact of hacking, it
may make a ground for the Azerbaijanis to spread disinformation
prepared beforehand when necessary through Armenian sites.
Such cases of massed attacks on Armenian sites happen several times a
year. At that, the attacks become more and more professional, more and
more human and financial resources are involved by the Azerbaijani
party and more and more important Armenian sites become target of
attacks. Accordingly, it becomes vitally important not only the
protection of the state owned sites but also the important Armenian
ones. There is an impression, more often proved factually, that the
Azerbaijani special services control a number of hacking groups, and
the attacks on Armenian sites are realized to reveal their weak points,
not for mere wracking. In that way it is more probable that a base is
prepared in Baku to completely destroy the Armenian segment of internet
when time comes. To confront such a threat and realize massive
counterattack Armenians must have skilled stuff as well as operation
strategy worked out beforehand.
Security of internal network
Hacking of Armenia's foreign ministry internal network in December of
the previous year became logical continuation of the Armenian party's
lack of system and systemized activity of the Azerbaijani party. Even
basing on open information in the press one could come to a conclusion
that the Azerbaijani special services controlled a number of hacking
groups used to attack against Armenia.
It is not the matter of little importance the task of protecting
electronic correspondence. To all appearances this issue is not devoted
appropriate attention to yet. So, the press secretary of Armenia's
Ministry of Defense has been many years using the free Russian server
mail.ru to dispatch press-release, the hacking of which is even openly
advertised in the internet and costs $50. There is no guarantee that at
the moment this mailbox is not under secret control of Azerbaijanis and
will be used at a proper time in their purpose.
It is quite obvious what serious losses may be inflicted by hacking
electronic perspective of high ranking officials. As a whole, there
must be a unique strategy of protecting the state internal network,
system of electronic documents circulation especially taking into
consideration the fact that in the country are more and more introduced
systems of electronic government, the danger of unapproved access to
the system is aggravated. It is not of little importance protection of
non governmental commercial networks of strategic importance, for
example, connected with energy systems the vulnerability of which may
cause catastrophic after-effects.
Propaganda
Almost nothing was undertaken by the Armenian party against Azerbaijani
and Turkish propaganda. The main operations in this direction are
performed by the Armenians from Armenia and Diaspora who are led by
their individual patriotism and enthusiasm. For example, the operations
against the disinformation of Azerbaijani mass media that the Armenians
of Lvov had claimed for the city to be called `Aryuc,' was conducted
only by the part of the Armenian internet-community, which managed to
make most of thy Ukrainian mass media take away the material from
internet sites. At that, in Azerbaijan and Turkey such issues are
almost completely undertaken by state structures. At that, not that big
stuff of specialists from the Armenian party could have conducted
monitoring of Azerbaijani agitation and disinformation and conducted
counterattacks. Taking into consideration the big number of Armenians
involved in information warfare individually, such a structure,
involving these individuals, could succeed in this front with minimum
outlets.
In Armenian press is all the time advertised Azerbaijani and Turkish
mass media, in particular in the internet. On the whole, one may say
that according to statistics the Armenian TV and newspapers advertise
Azerbaijani network resources more than the native ones. Moreover, the
Armenian mass media reprints the Turkish disinformation without
checking it properly, in that way replicating it among the Armenian
audience. Let alone that very often Azerbaijani news are just copied
preserving such terms as `Karabakh separatists,' in inverted commas are
used the words `genocide,' `NKR' etc.
Besides, there isn't even a common course of work with the state
symbolism. In the Armenian mass media is all the time spread propaganda
of state symbolism of Azerbaijan and Turkey in the most favorable
light. At the same time in the Armenian press there isn't even a single
approach to the NKR map. More often the Armenian audience sees the
former picture of NKAR (Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region) on TV
having no connection with Armenia. The fact that in the country no
attention is paid to such `trifles' is the symptom of lack of
understanding of the state approach importance both to inward and
outward propaganda.
In its turn, in the home market there is a complete lack of state
approach ` the local mass media almost doesn't elucidate life in
Nagorno-Karabakh, districts of Armenia, although, while understanding
the importance of the problem each publication must have its offices of
the correspondent in Stepanakert, as well as in district centers. As a
matter of fact there is only one Karabakh agency in the internet,
Karabakh-Open.com, which is quite quick to inform about the events in
the NKR. At that, other Armenian mass media pay no attention to this
resource continuing to draw information from Azerbaijani sources.
There is quite a paradoxical situation when for most of the Armenians
the main source of information in the internet is the Azerbaijani
informational portal Day.az, which at par of visits and citing exceeds
all the analogical Armenian sites taken together. It is worth
mentioning that in the period of `emergency' Day.az was very popular
among Armenians, as it skillfully aggregated the Armenian news from all
the sources, both official and opposition, which was not able to do any
of the Armenian publications.
Conclusion
In case of preserving up-to-date tendencies Armenia will in the near
future completely lose the initiative in the information warfare
against Azerbaijan and Turkey. It becomes vitally important foundation
of interdepartmental body coordinating information activity of the
National Security Service, Foreign Office, Ministry of Defense and
other departments to counteract, and what is more important, to
initiate activities in this direction.
Other issues of author
THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE ISSUE AS ISRAEL INSTRUMENT OF PRESSURE
[15.05.2008]
KOSOVO AS THE INSTRUMENT OF GLOBAL INFLUENCE [11.04.2008]
SOME INFORMATION ASPECTS OF THE ELECTIONS IN GEORGIA [12.02.2008]
AZERBAIJAN DEVELOPING INFORMATION WAR [29.01.2008]
Internet as a field of information war against Armenia [18.10.2006]
Washington and Moscow desiring to change the world's missile balance
[13.10.2006]
Samvel Martirosyan
"Noravank" Foundation
10 July 2008
Year by year Azerbaijan strengthens its positions in the information
front. It is connected with the fact that official Baku has begun
devoting more attention and finances to this issue. In its turn Turkey
traditionally demonstrates the state approach to the very question.
Security of the Armenian segment of internet
It is already the fourth year that the Azerbaijani country has been
waging a war against the Azerbaijani segment of internet. Azerbaijani
hackers are periodically joined by the Turkish ones. Thus, in February
2007 were hacked the sites of the ombudsman, `De Facto' agency and the
one of the National Statistic service under test. The warnings sent to
the site owners have shown that even many hours after what had happened
the fact of hacking was not noticed there. Last summer the Azerbaijanis
made use of the lack of vigilance of the Armenian provider `Web' and
took control over tens of Armenian sites, including the internet
projects of `Mediamax' agency hosted in the company's server. During
several months the company didn't correct its inadvertence, and accused
the site owners of what had happened. As a matter of fact it turned out
that the state structures responsible for the security didn't interfere
in the situation and only constant complains finally made the company
solve the problems in the server's security system. In the meantime the
Azerbaijanis are still satisfied with hacking sites or uploading
anti-Armenian information. However, if we take into consideration that
the owners of such important sites don't notice the fact of hacking, it
may make a ground for the Azerbaijanis to spread disinformation
prepared beforehand when necessary through Armenian sites.
Such cases of massed attacks on Armenian sites happen several times a
year. At that, the attacks become more and more professional, more and
more human and financial resources are involved by the Azerbaijani
party and more and more important Armenian sites become target of
attacks. Accordingly, it becomes vitally important not only the
protection of the state owned sites but also the important Armenian
ones. There is an impression, more often proved factually, that the
Azerbaijani special services control a number of hacking groups, and
the attacks on Armenian sites are realized to reveal their weak points,
not for mere wracking. In that way it is more probable that a base is
prepared in Baku to completely destroy the Armenian segment of internet
when time comes. To confront such a threat and realize massive
counterattack Armenians must have skilled stuff as well as operation
strategy worked out beforehand.
Security of internal network
Hacking of Armenia's foreign ministry internal network in December of
the previous year became logical continuation of the Armenian party's
lack of system and systemized activity of the Azerbaijani party. Even
basing on open information in the press one could come to a conclusion
that the Azerbaijani special services controlled a number of hacking
groups used to attack against Armenia.
It is not the matter of little importance the task of protecting
electronic correspondence. To all appearances this issue is not devoted
appropriate attention to yet. So, the press secretary of Armenia's
Ministry of Defense has been many years using the free Russian server
mail.ru to dispatch press-release, the hacking of which is even openly
advertised in the internet and costs $50. There is no guarantee that at
the moment this mailbox is not under secret control of Azerbaijanis and
will be used at a proper time in their purpose.
It is quite obvious what serious losses may be inflicted by hacking
electronic perspective of high ranking officials. As a whole, there
must be a unique strategy of protecting the state internal network,
system of electronic documents circulation especially taking into
consideration the fact that in the country are more and more introduced
systems of electronic government, the danger of unapproved access to
the system is aggravated. It is not of little importance protection of
non governmental commercial networks of strategic importance, for
example, connected with energy systems the vulnerability of which may
cause catastrophic after-effects.
Propaganda
Almost nothing was undertaken by the Armenian party against Azerbaijani
and Turkish propaganda. The main operations in this direction are
performed by the Armenians from Armenia and Diaspora who are led by
their individual patriotism and enthusiasm. For example, the operations
against the disinformation of Azerbaijani mass media that the Armenians
of Lvov had claimed for the city to be called `Aryuc,' was conducted
only by the part of the Armenian internet-community, which managed to
make most of thy Ukrainian mass media take away the material from
internet sites. At that, in Azerbaijan and Turkey such issues are
almost completely undertaken by state structures. At that, not that big
stuff of specialists from the Armenian party could have conducted
monitoring of Azerbaijani agitation and disinformation and conducted
counterattacks. Taking into consideration the big number of Armenians
involved in information warfare individually, such a structure,
involving these individuals, could succeed in this front with minimum
outlets.
In Armenian press is all the time advertised Azerbaijani and Turkish
mass media, in particular in the internet. On the whole, one may say
that according to statistics the Armenian TV and newspapers advertise
Azerbaijani network resources more than the native ones. Moreover, the
Armenian mass media reprints the Turkish disinformation without
checking it properly, in that way replicating it among the Armenian
audience. Let alone that very often Azerbaijani news are just copied
preserving such terms as `Karabakh separatists,' in inverted commas are
used the words `genocide,' `NKR' etc.
Besides, there isn't even a common course of work with the state
symbolism. In the Armenian mass media is all the time spread propaganda
of state symbolism of Azerbaijan and Turkey in the most favorable
light. At the same time in the Armenian press there isn't even a single
approach to the NKR map. More often the Armenian audience sees the
former picture of NKAR (Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region) on TV
having no connection with Armenia. The fact that in the country no
attention is paid to such `trifles' is the symptom of lack of
understanding of the state approach importance both to inward and
outward propaganda.
In its turn, in the home market there is a complete lack of state
approach ` the local mass media almost doesn't elucidate life in
Nagorno-Karabakh, districts of Armenia, although, while understanding
the importance of the problem each publication must have its offices of
the correspondent in Stepanakert, as well as in district centers. As a
matter of fact there is only one Karabakh agency in the internet,
Karabakh-Open.com, which is quite quick to inform about the events in
the NKR. At that, other Armenian mass media pay no attention to this
resource continuing to draw information from Azerbaijani sources.
There is quite a paradoxical situation when for most of the Armenians
the main source of information in the internet is the Azerbaijani
informational portal Day.az, which at par of visits and citing exceeds
all the analogical Armenian sites taken together. It is worth
mentioning that in the period of `emergency' Day.az was very popular
among Armenians, as it skillfully aggregated the Armenian news from all
the sources, both official and opposition, which was not able to do any
of the Armenian publications.
Conclusion
In case of preserving up-to-date tendencies Armenia will in the near
future completely lose the initiative in the information warfare
against Azerbaijan and Turkey. It becomes vitally important foundation
of interdepartmental body coordinating information activity of the
National Security Service, Foreign Office, Ministry of Defense and
other departments to counteract, and what is more important, to
initiate activities in this direction.
Other issues of author
THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE ISSUE AS ISRAEL INSTRUMENT OF PRESSURE
[15.05.2008]
KOSOVO AS THE INSTRUMENT OF GLOBAL INFLUENCE [11.04.2008]
SOME INFORMATION ASPECTS OF THE ELECTIONS IN GEORGIA [12.02.2008]
AZERBAIJAN DEVELOPING INFORMATION WAR [29.01.2008]
Internet as a field of information war against Armenia [18.10.2006]
Washington and Moscow desiring to change the world's missile balance
[13.10.2006]