Information Warfare and the Gulf Dispute

By Rhea Siers

Rhea Siers is the former Deputy Associate Director for Policy at NSA.  She currently works as a cybersecurity and national security consultant, attorney and educator and teaches at the Elliott School of International Affairs (George Washington University) and Johns Hopkins University.

The use of cyber capabilities to influence geopolitical confrontations has become more and more common. Even those countries who are not major global powers are turning to digital avenues to engage in information warfare and covert influence. The Cipher Brief’s Levi Maxey spoke with Rhea Siers, the former Deputy Associate Director for Policy at the U.S. National Security Agency, about the geopolitical ramifications of recent reports of the United Arab Emirates using cyberspace to escalate Gulf confrontations with Qatar and how it indicates a broadening use of cyber subversion in geopolitics for countries new to the virtual chessboard.

The Cipher Brief: Could you explain what the alleged UAE hack against the Qatari new agency included and whether it impacted the regional discord we are now seeing in the Gulf?  What are the regional dynamics leading up to the hack?

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