Spy in the Ministry of Energy lured journalists through Facebook? Another spectacular hacker attacks? It’s nothing new. Novum is an attempt to settle the problem taken up by the West. The Internet must be subject to regulations – says Wojciech Jakóbik, editor-in-chief of BiznesAlert.pl.
The spies watching the Polish energy policy were already loud about the case of Sławomir Sz., Also deeply analyzed at BiznesAlert.pl. This morning there was information about the arrest of an official of the Ministry of Energy suspected of spying for Russia. According to the Internal Security Agency, he was interested in Polish policy against the piped Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline. BiznesAlert.pl determined that he was the founder of the Facebook forum, where he was involved in the exchange of ideas with journalists and energy sector experts. The author of this article was also invited to the group. This is another example of Russia’s hostile action after the attempted murder of British citizen Sergey Skripal, who was a double agent recruited by British intelligence.
Another area of Russia’s hostile action is cyberspace. Although the media have been writing a lot lately about this topic, this is not a new phenomenon. The first cybernetic attacks on energy are not incidents in Saudi Arabia or the next aggressive actions of Russia towards the West. It’s a Stuxnet virus that broke Iran’s atomic centrifuges and cyber attacks on the Baltic States and Georgia in the first decade of this year. Unfortunately, no regulations have been created since that time, which would allow an adequate Western response to this threat.
Cyberattack can be a hybrid warfare tool, because difficulty in determining liability may allow an attacker to avoid consequences. It is not known how NATO is supposed to react. Is the cyber attack the basis for launching the fifth article, which obliges allies to react to an attack against one of them? Similarly, it can be with economic espionage via social media. Is the discussion on the Facebook forum falling under the hostile actions of a foreign state? Can you consider such comments from the Russian troll factory as such?
The West has not yet managed to regulate this threat. The Americans recognized that cyberattack could be the basis for them to declare war. The subject of cyberattacks and information war is being taken by NATO countries. However, there are no instruments to react to new threats of this type. For this reason, the initiative of the European Union and NATO to regulate this issue is important. New regulations are also important, which will regulate the activity of users on the Internet. In the face of increasing tension in the Cold War between the West and Russia, there is no escape from the regulation of the network, especially in the face of increasing information noise and unusual activities as part of economic or political intelligence. How to do it? This will be one of the most important discussions facing the West.