India Military Gears Up for Cyber Warfare

Guarding the borders, fighting militants and training for blitzkrieg battles is just not enough now. Facing mounting attacks in the virtual world, the Indian Army is not going high-tech. It is gearing up for battles in the digitised battlefield as well.

The ongoing army commanders' conference, chaired by General Deepak Kapoor, has decided to boost the "cyber-security" of its information networks right down to the level of divisions, which are basically field formations with over 15,000 troops.

Apart from creating cyber-security organisations down to the division-level to guard against cyber warfare and data thefts, the Army top brass has also underlined the urgent need for "periodic cyber-security audits" by the Army Cyber Security Establishment (ACSE).

"The most advanced armies in the world like the US one also face 3,000 to 4,000 attempts a year to hack their networks. As our Army boosts its infotech levels, we also become more vulnerable to such threats. Future conflicts will be fought by 'networks'," said a senior officer.

Both China and Pakistan, for instance, are bolstering their cyber-warfare or information warfare capabilities at a rapid clip. China, in particular, has made cyber-warfare one of its topmost military priorities, with Chinese hackers breaking into sensitive computer networks of the US, UK, Germany and even India on a regular basis.

"By crippling or destroying an adversary's economic, communication and strategic networks and infrastructure, cyber-warfare can even prove more deadly than ballistic missile strikes. It can, for instance, be in the form of denial-of-service cyber-attacks and paralysing computer viruses," said another officer.

The Indian armed forces, of course, are also trying to hone their information warfare weapons as well as enhance their C4ISR (command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance) capabilities.

The tri-service integrated defence staff, on its part, has also come out with an information warfare doctrine. But the progress is slow compared to the infotech boom in the civilian arena.

Even as the armed forces take some strides forward on the infotech superhighway, the need to protect their own systems from cyber-attacks of hostile forces is increasingly being felt.

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X3 Service Pack

A small incompatibility with a relatively rare software package has held up the SP3 release train for the time being, but users can still snag the files from Microsoft.

Though Microsoft had previously announced that it would be releasing Windows XP Service Pack 3 to the Web on Tuesday, the company backed off its decision in the eleventh hour due to a glitch it discovered with certain software. The official service pack release will now be delayed until Microsoft can build a filter to keep those with the problematic software from installing it, but the files are still available on Microsoft’s server, despite the lack of a proper release.

“In the last few days, we have uncovered a compatibility issue between Microsoft Dynamics Retail Management System (RMS) and both Windows XP SP3 and Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1),” said Microsoft’s Windows release manager Chris Keroack in an official forum posting.”In order to make sure customers have the best possible experience, we have decided to delay releasing Windows XP Service Pack 3 (SP3) to the web.”

While Microsoft advises those with the Microsoft Dynamics RMS not to install the update, the overwhelming majority of users without such software installed can still download the update by directly accessing the files on Microsoft’s servers. The English 32-bit version is available here.

Tej Kohli