Patriotic Hacktivism: A plausible concept for the militarily weaker nations to dominate the cyberspace

In early 2021, all United Nations member governments agreed to 11 guidelines for cyber activity, but these were soon undermined by Russia's invasion of Ukraine. 

The  issue is not just the Russian cyber-attacks on Ukrainian civilian infrastructure, but also the Patriotic Hacking in support of Ukraine, which was encouraged, if not coordinated, by  state officials. 

While governments supporting privateering in cyberspace is not new, Ukraine's actions go against recently agreed-to norms on state behaviour in cyberspace.  

This goes beyond just Ukraine's clever use of an underdog defence. It challenges existing norms on civilian involvement in the war, how the laws of armed conflict apply to cyberspace, and state responsibility for cybercrimes. 

Traditionally, cyberwarfare has been carried out by government organisations.  However, the concept of state-sponsored Patriotic Hacktivism has gained attention in  recent times. 

Patriotic Hacking refers to computer hacking or system cracking carried out by citizens or supporters of a country, with the goal of attacking or blocking perceived  enemies of the state. 

This activity can be either individual or organisational, and may be self-motivated or sponsored by the state. Patriotic Hacking is different from black-hat hacking, which is done for personal profit or out of malice. 

Patriotic Hackers often target government agencies and corporations associated with the government, but they also target citizens with political messages and propaganda designed to provoke a specific emotional response (Healey & Grinberg, 2022). 

According to the laws of war, patriotic hackers operate in a legal gray zone, as they are neither explicitly civilians nor combatants. This ambiguity is useful for states since the anonymous nature of cyberwarfare techniques may allow an almost risk-free method of silently withdrawing attack or even less repercussion if caught.  

Patriotic hacking probably originated in China back in the 1990s in response to  anti-Chinese riots in Indonesia (Healey & Grinberg, 2022). The concept has been quickly embraced as a tactic by China and Russia, and later Syria and a few other  countries.

Chinese hacking operation against the US Office of Personnel Management in 2015, Russian hacking operation against Estonia in 2007, meddling in US national  elections in 2017, attacking NATO's Centers of Excellence in 2022, Iranian hacking  operation against the U.S Federal Depository Library Program in 2020 are few of the  well-known examples of state-sponsored patriotic hacking prior to the ongoing Ukraine war (Radware, 2018; Young, 2022). 

Developing cyberwarfare capabilities is typically inexpensive and more of a matter in the knowledge domain. Nonetheless, it has all the potential to upset the balance of  power. Because of this, cyberwarfare is more relevant for weaker nation-states or non-state organisations where an asymmetry of power exists between rivals. 

Countries may find that cyberwarfare techniques like cyber-attack are the least expensive offensive  capacity to strive for in the face of increasing difficulty in investing in military arsenals that  have an ever-escalating price trend. 

Besides, the anonymous nature of cyber warfare techniques may allow an almost risk-free method of silently withdrawing an attack or even less repercussion if caught.  

As per National Cyber Power Index (NCPI) 2020, China ranked 2nd and Russia  ranked 4th in cyber power and both countries have some of the best government-backed  hacking divisions with equally talented hacktivists. 

Even after having so much hacking capability, they had to resort to the support of Patriotic Hackers to mitigate resource constraints and avoid legal complicacy. 

In a July 2021 press conference, a senior Biden administration official told reporters that China's Ministry of State Security "is using,  knowledgeably, criminal contract hackers to conduct unsanctioned cyber operations  globally" (Young, 2022).  

Patriotic hacking is not a novel idea, and other nations have experimented with it in the past. 

The current effort in Ukraine, however, has stronger and longer-lasting official  linkages than any of those earlier operations did. The actions of Ukraine against the  powerful Russian armies have provided useful lessons for other nations. 

The militarily weaker nation might attempt to employ the idea in future conflicts given that it is less technologically and militarily advanced than potential adversaries.

Lieutenant Colonel Md Emdadul Islam, afwc, psc, G, Artillery is serving in the Armed Forces Division as General Staff Officer, Grade 1.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and views of The Business Standard.