Analogical reasoning and cyber security

Betz, David; Stevens, Tim

doi:10.1177/0967010613478323

Cited by 62 publications

(39 citation statements)

References 64 publications

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“…It is little wonder that we attempt to classify […] the unfamiliar present and unknowable future in terms of a more familiar past, but we should remain mindful of the limitations of analogical reasoning in cyber security (Betz and Stevens 2013). …”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Limits of Deterrence Theory in Cyberspace

Taddeo

2017

Philos. Technol.

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In this article, I analyse deterrence theory and argue that its applicability to cyberspace is limited and that these limits are not trivial. They are the consequence of fundamental differences between deterrence theory and the nature of cyber conflicts and cyberspace. The goals of this analysis are to identify the limits of deterrence theory in cyberspace, clear the ground of inadequate approaches to cyber deterrence, and define the conceptual space for a domain-specific theory of cyber deterrence, still to be developed.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Limits of Deterrence Theory in Cyberspace

Taddeo

2017

Philos. Technol.

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“…This study employs a combination of rhetorical analysis of key texts that have deployed the cyber Pearl Harbor analogy over the past 25 years with a quantitative content analysis of U.S. newspaper articles in which the analogy appears during the same time period. In each case, analysis was informed by theoretical insights from the critical constructivist tradition of scholarship in security studies (Peoples & Vaughan-Williams 2010), including other scholarship that has explored the role of language and rhetoric in U.S. cyber security discourse (Bendrath 2001(Bendrath , 2003(Bendrath , 2007Dunn Cavelty 2008;Eriksson 2002;Hansen & Nissenbaum 2009;Lawson 2012;Betz & Stevens 2013).…”

Section: Sources and Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cyber Pearl Harbor: Analogy, fear, and the framing of cyber security threats in the United States, 1991-2016

Lawson

Middleton

2019

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During the two and a half decades leading up to the Russian cyber attacks on the 2016 U.S. presidential election, public policy discourse about cybersecurity typically framed cybersecurity using metaphors and analogies to war and tended to focus on catastrophic doom scenarios involving cyber attacks against critical infrastructure. In this discourse, the so-called “cyber Pearl Harbor” attack was always supposedly just around the corner. Since 2016, however, many have argued that fixation on cyber Pearl Harbor-like scenarios was an inaccurate framing that left the United States looking in the wrong direction when Russia struck. This essay traces the use of the cyber Pearl Harbor analogy and metaphor over the 25-year period preceding the Russian cyber attacks of 2016. It argues that cyber Pearl Harbor has been a consistent feature of U.S. cybersecurity discourse with a largely stable meaning focused on catastrophic physical impacts. Government officials have been primarily responsible for driving these concerns with news media uncritically transmitting their claims. This is despite the fact that such claims were often ambiguous about just who might carry out such an attack and often lacked supporting evidence.

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“…The inventor of the term 'cyberspace' -science fiction author William Gibson -stated early on that cyberspace was an 'evocative and essentially meaningless' buzzword (Betz and Stevens 2013). Although this still holds true, it is hard to avoid the term altogether.…”

Section: Instrumentalising Cybersecurity To Preserve Government Contrmentioning

confidence: 98%