Israel launched an airstrike in response to a Hamas cyberattack | The Verge

An ominous military milestone; tangentially, see The Cybersecurity 202: A cyberattack just disrupted grid operations in the U.S. But it could have been far worse | Washington Post

"What’s novel about this particular incident is that it appears to be the first time that a military has met a cyberattack with a real-world response during an ongoing battle. As ZDNet’s Catalin Cimpanu points out, the US targeted a member of ISIS back in 2015 after he released US service member records online, but that attack didn’t occur in real-time. “Israel’s response against Hamas marks the first time that a country has reacted with immediate military force to a cyber-attack in an active conflict,” Cimpanu writes.

The attack raises serious questions about the incident, and what it means for similar incidents. A general principle of warfare and international humanitarian laws hold that attacks must be proportional in response. (For example, a country wouldn’t be permitted to launch a nuclear missile against a capitol city if a single soldier is killed in a border skirmish.) Given that the IDF admitted that it had halted the attack prior to the airstrike, the question is now whether or not the response was appropriate. Either way, it opens up a worrying evolution in the state of modern warfare, given the threat that computer hackers can pose to military forces or nations."

Israel launched an airstrike in response to a Hamas cyberattack | The Verge