Information or cyber warfare is computer related attacks which are guided towards information and information systems for the purposes of causing terror. Many of the cyber crimes are politically instigated and they are carried out by clandestine groups targeting non combatant groups. Enemies can collect information so as to have a competitive advantage over their foes, especially on matters of security (Van Niekerk & Maharaj, 2011). A good example of information warfare was the denial-of –service (DOS) attacks by Russia on Estonia in 2007 and on Georgia in 2008. The greatest risk that any information warfare can pose is infrastructural risk. Countries all over the world are highly dependent on technology to carry out services such as communication, transport, electrical grid, and manufacturing facilities. For instance, Estonia is one of the most internet dependent countries in the provision of services to the citizens; this made the country highly vulnerable to Russian cyber attacks on their systems. The first area that was affected by these attacks was the government websites, where traffic was used to bombard the websites so people could be denied service. The other greatly affected areas in Estonia were the news publications as they could not convey information internationally because their systems were jammed. The banking system was greatly affected by the attacks, people could not access all the online services of banks, and the debit cards for banks, especially Hansbank, could not be used inside and outside the country. According to Lewis (2014) from a military strategic perspective, attacks that do not degrade national capabilities are not significant. This shows how information warfare can disrupt national services that are dependent on information systems. Other critical infrastructures that can be attacked are dams that can disrupt water supplies, and air traffic. https://homeworkharbour.info/have-instructions-attached-along-with-a-few-powerpoint-decks-also-included-a-su Information warfare poses a security risk in any country. Cyberwarfare is not all about disruption and destroying of information but involves hacking information systems to obtain confidential information. This action can lead to personal, institutional and national security risk issues. Hackers can access the information about prominent people and use it against them for political or any other gain. Personal information that can be useful to hackers include photos, business document, bank documents etc. In an institutional level information can be obtained for the purposes of competition or tarnishing the image of the company. One of the most important information that can be stolen from an organizations database is the trade secrets which can be used by competitors to gain a competitive advantage. All the countries around the world are faced with security risks that are caused by cyber warfare. Currently the United States is more concerned by cyber warfare m.

1. Information or cyber warfare is computer related attacks which
are guided towards information and information systems for the
purposes of causing terror. Many of the cyber crimes are
politically instigated and they are carried out by clandestine
groups targeting non combatant groups. Enemies can collect
information so as to have a competitive advantage over their
foes, especially on matters of security (Van Niekerk & Maharaj,
2011). A good example of information warfare was the denial-of
–service (DOS) attacks by Russia on
Estonia
in 2007 and on Georgia in 2008.
The greatest risk that any information warfare can pose is
infrastructural risk. Countries all over the world are highly
dependent on technology to carry out services such as
communication, transport, electrical grid, and manufacturing
facilities. For instance, Estonia is one of the most internet
dependent countries in the provision of services to the citizens;
this made the country highly vulnerable to Russian cyber
attacks on their systems. The first area that was affected by
these attacks was the government websites, where traffic was
used to bombard the websites so people could be denied service.
The other greatly affected areas in Estonia were the news
publications as they could not convey information
internationally because their systems were jammed. The banking
system was greatly affected by the attacks, people could not
access all the online services of banks, and the debit cards for
banks, especially Hansbank, could not be used inside and
outside the country. According to Lewis (2014) from a military
strategic perspective, attacks that do not degrade national
capabilities are not significant. This shows how information
warfare can disrupt national services that are dependent on
information systems. Other critical infrastructures that can be

2. attacked are dams that can disrupt water supplies, and air
traffic. https://homeworkharbour.info/have-instructions-
attached-along-with-a-few-powerpoint-decks-also-included-a-su
Information warfare poses a security risk in any country.
Cyberwarfare is not all about disruption and destroying of
information but involves hacking information systems to obtain
confidential information. This action can lead to personal,
institutional and national security risk issues. Hackers can
access the information about prominent people and use it
against them for political or any other gain. Personal
information that can be useful to hackers include photos,
business document, bank documents etc. In an institutional level
information can be obtained for the purposes of competition or
tarnishing the image of the company. One of the most important
information that can be stolen from an organizations database is
the trade secrets which can be used by competitors to gain a
competitive advantage. All the countries around the world are
faced with security risks that are caused by cyber warfare.
Currently the United States is more concerned by cyber warfare
more than terrorism. The United States spends an average of $
300 billion on issues related to cyber warfare (Schwartau,
1994). Clandestine groups can infiltrate a country’s security
systems in a bid to obtain information that can be helpful to
them. The information can be used to improve the security
strategies of the enemy, know the strategies that are being
employed by the target country in order to device counteractive
measures. The hackers can also infiltrate national security
systems to obtain technological information that can be useful
to the enemy.
Many of the information warfare are based around
infrastructural and security issues, but there are other groups
that are concerned with economic issues. In his book, Libicki
(1995) defines economic information warfare as channeling or
blocking information to pursue economic dominance. Libicki

3. says that trade is war; competitors would go to any length to
ensure that they monopolize the information they have.
Economic information warfare is practiced through economic
imperialism and economic blockade. Disruption and blocking of
information flow to a specific territory is known as economic
blockade. In 2007, Estonia was cut from external information
flow and this adversely affected the economy of the country,
especially the financial institutions. Many countries depend on
foreign trade, and an attack on its information in terms of
information blockade can prove to be catastrophic to the
economy. Economic imperialism is created by the war between
countries in establishing information networks in order to
dominate strategic economic industries.
https://homeworkbay.info/2021/06/01/discussion-topicin-this-
final-discussion-consider-how-the-knowledge-of-psychol/
Jones, Kovacich & Luzwick (2002) categorized systems used to
curb information warfare into six categories i.e., education and
training, policy, doctrine, assessment, organizational
infrastructure, and technology. These are the areas that are used
today in the war against information warfare. After the
devastating effects of the denial of service attacks on Estonia,
the country embarked on several measures that have been
effective in protecting the country’s information systems
against cyber warfare. The country increased its preparedness
against similar attacks by mapping its critical information
structure, by doing so, the country came up with a cyber defense
infrastructure that has been difficult for the Russians or any
other enemy to penetrate since 2007. The country was able to
train citizens of the country who hold crucial IT positions to
increase the survivability of their information systems and
educate individuals against similar attacks. The country
established a state information agency that comprises of a cyber
defense department, national computer emergency response
team and critical infrastructure department (Ackerman, 2014).

4. For the attacks in Georgia, they increased information sharing
between the government and the private sector; this has enabled
the private sector to point out vulnerable points in the
information systems and come up with a collaborative effort on
how to deal with identified issues. In order to handle
cybersecurity threats effectively and solve security threat
issues, the government of Georgia established the Computer
Emergency Response Team (CERT), which has overseen policy
implementations and continuous improvement of Georgia’s
cyber defenses. The doctrine for information operations
comprises principles for both for both offensive and defensive
information operations and deals with organization,
responsibilities, coordination between levels of command,
planning considerations, integration and de-confliction of
activities and intelligence support (Jones, Kovacich & Luzwick,
2002).
The United States has also not been spared by the jaws of
information warfare. In 2006, the Chinese allegedly broke into
the State Department’s computer system seeking information
related to China and North Korea. Not much damage was
realized with respect to information loss as only a few
unclassified information was taken. The United States increased
information sharing between government and private
institutions; this was boosted by President Obama signing an
executive order to increase the information sharing, this reduced
incidences of such magnitude in the United States.
Identity theft occurs when a clandestine group gets sufficient
information of an individual and they are able to use it for
impersonation. Cybercrime is directly linked to identity theft,
even though not all the information obtained by identity thieves
is stolen online. Cybercrimes are used to obtain even secure
information online and manipulated for different gains. People
are increasingly storing their personal information online and
this has increased the vulnerability of such information being

5. stolen. The most common issue of identity theft is the
government documents or benefits frauds. People such as
immigrants or terrorists can obtain the information of any
individual such as social security number and addresses to
obtain government documents such as licenses. These
documents can also be used by drug traffickers in conducting
their illegal activities. These impersonated government
documents are used by criminals to obtain government benefits
such as travel state lines.
The second most prominent means used by identity thieves is
the credit cards. The criminals can access the personal
information of a credit card holder and open a new credit card
with the details or actually get access to the credit card if one
loses it. The criminals accumulate monthly bills for an
individual without knowing, leaving them unable to pay the
accrued bills. An individual can take even more than two years
without knowing his information is being used by another credit
card; this has seen the damage of credit scores of many
individuals. Sometimes these criminals access the information
from installing skimming devices in ATM machines that are in
obscure areas. Criminals use health insurance information for an
insurance holder and pile up medical bills for medical
treatments one never had.
Phone and utility bills form a big part of the bills in many
homes; criminals can change the address form using an
individual’s personal information. The criminals use this
information to open multiple accounts and rack up unpaid utility
and phone bills. Fraudsters can use impersonation for
employment purposes; they can use the security number to gain
employment because of their bad track record in employment.
This can ruin the track record of the genuine owner by
providing future misleading information. A loan fraud is similar
to a credit card fraud where an individual can obtain a loan
using another person’s information therefore leaving him with

6. the loan repayment burden.
E-commerce companies conduct most of their operation online
through websites, and they are vulnerable to cyber-attacks.
These companies have become more secure over the years due
to the increase in information sharing and collaboration between
different sectors. Most of the security breaches emanate from
the end-user’s side because of inadequate knowledge. E-
commerce companies are using secure socket layer
authentication in securing their communication with their
clients. The companies are securing the payments by using
merchants who are PCI compliant. The E-commerce companies
keep a limited amount of data concerning their clients as they
regularly purge old customer records. Companies have installed
multiple security layers such as firewalls, secure password
logins, etc to prevent cybercrimes. Most of the websites are
signed up to denial of service protection with cloud based to
prevent any unwanted traffic. The companies have resulted in
training their clients on how they can improve security issues
on their end.
E-bay is a company that provides sales services online around
the world for different products. Just like any other e-commerce
company, the company is faced with issues of cybercrime. The
clients of e-bay pay for their services online, and this poses a
threat to their personal information being hacked. E-bay has a
team that inspects breaches from other companies and looks at
the strengths and weakness of their company in comparison with
the other company. E-bay advises their consumers not to re-use
their passwords because this increases the chances of social
engineering. The company stresses that the most important
password is the email password because hackers can use it to
obtain all the other passwords. Customers should be careful
with what they do with their email and response to emails
(azcentral, 2015). E-bay ensures secure payment of their clients

7. through Apple play, and they have provided multiple layers of
security protection in their website.