Goodbye Cyberwar: Ukraine as Reality Check
Evidence from Ukraine shows that cyber operations are either too slow, too weak, or too volatile to provide significant strategic value in hybrid conflict and war, argue Lennart Maschmeyer and Myriam Dunn Cavelty in this CSS Policy Perspective.
Key Points
- The expectation that cyberwar – a high-level, destructive attack via cyberspace – is imminent is based on a series of misconceptions about what it takes to deliver targeted effects in cyberspace.
- A sober look at the evidence shows that cyber operations are either too slow, too weak, or too volatile to serve as attack tools in military operations. Even in hybrid settings, they offer limited strategic value.
- The policy debate needs to move away from its technological over-fixation and to stop misrepresenting any politically motivated cyber incident as a harbinger of cyber doom.
- Cyber operations are only useful for intelligence gathering or disruptive operations when the timing and severity of the effect does not matter for the success of the operation.