Affecting trust: Terrorism, internet and offensive information warfare

Abstract

The national security consequences of the potential use of the Internet by terrorist organizations have attracted the interest of many academics and government and intelligence officials. The goal of this article is to provide a new explanatory angle concerning the possible targets of terrorists’ offensive information warfare (OIW) operations. It argues that these organizations may prove more valuable and effective to undermine on‐line activities of leading electronic commerce sites than to target elements of the critical national information infrastructure. These offensive actions, in fact, would directly impact one of the explanatory elements for the Internet's success: users’ perception of its trustworthiness. Before tackling its arguments, the article provides a definition of offensive information warfare. Then, it investigates how terrorist organizations would formulate their operational style concerning offensive information warfare. The stage is then set to define the central argument of the article by drawing from studies carried out in the areas of information security, international management and electronic commerce. The article concludes with a set of policy recommendations to counter these potential threats and thus make the Internet a safer communication instrument for economic, commercial and social development.