“Cyber space is a realm where small states can take on bigger States, a small state with a credible cyber offensive capability can harm a more powerful state. This is the reason why many states are not very co operative on cyber security issues as they don’t want to give up this capability” said Toby Simon the Founder and President of Synergia Foundation he was speaking at a panel discussion on Cyber Security organised at the India International Center, New Delhi recently.
Simon noted that small groups or even individuals could utilise latest technologies to unleash unprecedented levels of chaos and destruction “Genetics, Nanotechnology and Robotics are so powerful that they can bring about whole new classes of accidents and abuses. The worrying part is that these accidents and abuses are within the reach of individuals or small groups, you don’t require a large facility of raw materials, knowledge alone would suffice thus arises the possibility of knowledge enabled mass destruction this destructiveness is usually amplified by the power of self replication.”
He also warned of a future where technology could get out of control of humans “Singularity is the future point where artificial intelligence would exceed human intelligence. Machines would make themselves smarter and smarter AI is intelligence created by human intelligence, AI ++ is AI above human intelligence, AI + + + is super intelligence which constitutes singularity. Humans would create Artificial Intelligence and artificial intelligence would then create AI ++, AI ++ would create AI + + +.”
Vijay Latha Reddy co- chairperson, ‘Global Commission on the Stability of Cyberspace’ stressed the need of globally accepted rules that would be applicable to the cyber space “As Cyber Space is a borderless medium having a national policy is not sufficient we need international cooperation and put norms in place which the whole world agrees upon, without that cyberspace would never be safe. The UNGGE norms were accepted as non-binding, voluntary- for the norms to be effective these need to be legislated and made binding at some stage.”
Reddy also identified strategic exigencies as the biggest impediment to achieving international cooperation on cyber security “We live in a geo political atmosphere which is particularly complex, US still has a great dominance in the field of Cyber Space and it is extremely hostile for any system which seeks to include Russia and certainly has mixed feelings towards China.”
