Abstract
This paper attempts to answer the question of whether digital terrorism, also known as cyberterrorism, exists. The paper defines terrorism both in the conventional and digital sense. It then gives a short history of conventional terrorism, dating back two thousand years and ending with the terrorist activities in several third-world nations. The essay then discusses digital terrorism, highlighting the Estonian, Georgian, and Ukrainian cyber-attacks. The work concludes that digital terrorism does indeed exist, but that the future is uncertain in the sense that future cyber-attacks will probably not resemble past attacks as the technology advances.
Highlights
This paper attempts to answer the question of whether digital terrorism, known as cyberterrorism, exists
Digital terrorism can be described as the intentional employment of computers, networks, andAccording to Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary, terrorism is “the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion the Internet to create harm and damage in the promotion of personal objectives through hacking government systems, hospital records, or even national security programs such that an organization or country may end up fearing future digital attacks[11]
The question that this essay is attempting to answer is whether digital terrorism or what is commonly known as cyber terrorism exists
Summary
According to Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary, terrorism is “the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion”[1]. Jenkins defined terrorism to be “the systematic use of violence to create a general climate of fear in a population and thereby to bring about a particular political objective”[2]. According to the United Nations Security Council (“UNSC”) in Resolution 1566, terrorism is criminal act against civilians “committed with the intent to cause death or serious bodily injury, or taking of hostages, with the purpose to provoke a state of terror in the general public or in a group of persons or particular persons ...”9. Digital terrorism can be described as the intentional employment of computers, networks, andAccording to Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary, terrorism is “the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion the Internet to create harm and damage in the promotion of personal objectives through hacking government systems, hospital records, or even national security programs such that an organization or country may end up fearing future digital attacks[11]. Similar to the definition of garden variety terrorism, the objective is political or ideological, where the idea is to disrupt the status quo and change the behavior of the leaders of organizations or nations[12]
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