* This W ashington Post article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/18/AR2010031805464.html was summarized in (and linked to, from) ACM's TechNews: http://technews.acm.org/archives.cfm?fo=2010-03-mar/mar-19-2010.html#455307 The summary says: Dismantling of Saudi-CIA Web Site Illustrates Need for Clearer Cyberwar Policies* *Washington Post (03/19/10) P. A1; Nakashima, Ellen; Priest, Dana; DeYoung, Karen* The dissolution of an intelligence-gathering Web site set up by the Saudi government and the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), based on suspicions that it was being used by extremists planning attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq, highlights the need for more transparent cyberwar policies. The use of computers to collect intelligence or to disrupt the enemy raises a number of issues, including under what circumstances a cyberattack outside the theater of war is permissible and whether dismantling an extremist Web site represents a covert operation or a traditional military activity. Current and former officials say that lawyers at the U.S. Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel are engaged in a struggle to define the legal rules governing cyberwarfare. A key dilemma of cyberwarfare is that an attacker can never be sure that only the intended target will be impacted by an attack. A former official notes than more than 300 servers in Saudi Arabia, Germany, and Texas were unintentionally disrupted when the Saudi-CIA site was dismantled. View Full Article - May Require Free Registration | *Return to Headlines* and here are some juicy quotes [IMHO] from the original * W ash. Post article: * > The Saudi-CIA Web site was set up several years ago as a "honey pot," [...] > [...] some experts counter that dismantling Web sites is ineffective -- no sooner does a site come down than a mirror site pops up somewhere else. [...] > "It seems difficult to understand," he [Evan F. Kohlmann] [a terrorism researcher] added, "why governments would interrupt [...] a lucrative intelligence-gathering tool." ("forwarded" by:) -- Mike Schwartz Glendale AZ schwartz@acm.org