A New Political Weapon? Cyberattacks in Non-Democratic Regimes

在当今世界，现代信息和通信技术，特别是因特网，开辟了一个新的通信领域。有些人认为，信通技术带来的最根本的变化发生在非民主国家，在这些国家，信通技术基础设施和通信已成为出于政治目的的争夺对象，政府和反对派行为者可以在数字领域采取一些策略。其中一种策略是使用拒绝服务（DoS）攻击。在DoS攻击中，目标服务器被流量淹没到无法再到达的程度。一些突出的例子表明，拒绝服务攻击正在成为政治冲突的重要武器，无论是政府试图阻止动员，还是反对派试图关闭重要的政府目标。然而，迄今为止，缺乏系统的分析。在专制国家中，拒绝服务攻击的模式是什么？谁使用它们，后果是什么？为了填补学术文献中的这些空白，该项目与互联网测量专家的计算机科学家合作。在这些专家的帮助下，该项目利用全球互联网上大规模的拒绝服务攻击数据收集，以便系统地衡量全球所有国家之间和国家内部的攻击发生率。这种系统化的大规模数据收集将首次使以下方面成为可能：（i）绘制全球拒绝服务攻击模式，并分析它们受政治驱动的程度;（ii）测试这些“新”竞争策略如何与抗议和镇压等传统策略相互作用;以及（iii）确定这些攻击的影响，无论是在国际关注方面，也是为了抗议当地的动态。

In today’s world, modern information and communication technology (ICT), in particular the Internet, has opened up a new sphere of communication. Some argue that the most fundamental changes introduced by ICT have taken place in non-democratic countries, where ICT infrastructure and communication have become contested for political purposes, and governments and opposition actors can employ a number of tactics in the digital realm. One of the tactics is the use of Denial-of-service (DoS) attacks. In a DoS attack, the targeted server is flooded with traffic to the extent that it cannot be reached anymore. A number of prominent examples suggest that DoS attacks are becoming an important weapon for political conflict both for governments attempting to prevent mobilization, but also by opposition actors attempting to shut down important government targets. So far, however, a systematic analysis is lacking. What are the patterns of DoS attacks in autocratic countries? Who uses them, and what are the consequences? In order to fill these gaps in the scholarly literature, this project teams up with computer scientists that are experts in Internet measurement. With the help of these experts, the project leverages large-scale data collection of DoS attacks on the global Internet in order to systematically measure the incidence of the attacks across and within all states worldwide. This systematic, large-scale data collection will make it possible, for the first time, to (i) map out the global patterns of DoS attacks and analyze the extent to which they are driven by politics, (ii) test how these “new” tactics of contention interact with conventional ones such as protest and repression, and (iii) determine the effects of these attacks both when it comes to international attention, but also to protest dynamics on the ground.