Russian Cybertricks Will Only Escalate

Russia hacked our election and got what it wanted: The spies believed to have stolen and leaked thousands of emails from the Democratic National Committee last year injected chaos and distraction into Hillary Clinton’s campaign and doubt into the minds of American voters about the legitimacy of the US electoral process. And the victory of Putin’s preferred presidential candidate means the Kremlin’s information warfare tactics will only get more aggressive. “They’re weaponizing information for the purposes of influencing elections,” says Dmitri Alperovitch, CTO of security firm Crowdstrike, which was the first to link the Russian government to the DNC hack, months before US intelligence agencies confirmed Russia’s involvement. “They’re going to absolutely attempt to do it again.” Unlike in that other cold war, the security world has yet to settle on a form of mutual deterrence. So expect escalation: not only outright hacking and social media disinformation in countries like Germany, France, and the Netherlands that have approaching elections, but also subtler data sabotage and maybe even attacks on physical infrastructure. (The mayhem of a few leaked emails looks tame in comparison to the kind of hacker-­induced shutdown that hit a Ukrainian power plant in late 2015.) The Obama administration promised to keep Russia in check. Donald Trump’s friendly approach to Putin and dismissal of promises to defend NATO allies have practically dared Russia to press its luck.