A warning to the complacent

Just as we have ways to fight certain serious diseases but find ourselves helpless in the face of the common cold, so too does the internet finds it difficult to deal with a denial-of-service attack, an attack that is simple and easy to execute.

Such attacks involve simply bombarding a given website with millions of pieces of junk traffic simultaneously. This can be done with robots set to "wake up" and at a precise time start contacting the site, causing a traffic overload that prevent people from accessing it.

If until now cyber experts thought that we needed to protect "smart home" elements to prevent hackers from getting in and taking over control of our televisions or refrigerators, now they are starting to think in the opposite direction: how to prevent the possibility of smart home elements, which will eventually find their way into every household, from being hacked and turned into robots that can be used in cyber attacks that could bring down half the internet, as happened on Friday.

Experts in cyber security expect to see increased exploitation of internet-enabled devices for attacks designed to prevent access to certain sites, now that the author of the Mirai malware has released open code that lets any beginning programmer carry out robot attacks on selected targets.

Attacks like the one this weekend only highlight the fragility of the internet, and how one malicious action can interfere with hundreds and even thousands of sites, even the biggest ones in the world. The attack also raises our awareness of how dependent on the internet we have become to obtain and share information, to conduct financial transactions, and to carry out dozens of other activities that have moved into the virtual world.

The fragile foundations of the internet must be defended, and in more ways than one. This latest attack is a warning light to the complacent and another business opportunity for our startup nation's flourishing cyber experts to find new ways of fighting the endless war against those who seek to stop technology.

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