Obama gets power to wage pre-emptive cyber warfare
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/02/04/obama-gets-power-to-wage-pre-emptive-cyber-warfare/
Obama gets power to wage
pre-emptive cyber warfare
By Stephen C. Webster
Monday, February 4, 2013 15:59 EST
A secret internal review has concluded that President Barack Obama can lawfully engage in
pre-emptive cyber attacks in the event that the U.S. faces an imminent threat, according to The New York Times.
The legal guidance was key to rules the administration hopes to adopt in the coming weeks to govern cyber warfare operations. The Times added that those rules will classified similarly to the policies governing the nations drone warfare program.
The president is only known to have launched one cyberwar operation, against Iran. It was codenamed Olympic Games, and focused on developing computer viruses that caused havoc within the countrys nuclear program. Thats where the Stuxnet virus came from, the Times reported last June.
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The secrecy of the law has also got civil liberties advocates worried. The ACLU warned in November that the presidents recent directive to vet critics infrastructure for cyber security flaws may actually allow military deployment within the United States. Similar proposals have been stopped up in Congress for years, leading the president to suggest he will use executive authority to shore up the nations cyber defenses if Congress cannot.
unhappycamper comment: I get very nervous when I hear the word pre-emptive.