Estonia's Defense Minister Sees More Cyber Attacks in the Future

Estonian Defense Minister Jaak Aaviksoo spoke at the Center for Strategic and International Studies on the recent cyber attacks on Estonian systems. Mr. Aaviksoo gave an indication of the magnitude of those attacks and predicted there would be future attacks:

"The attacks appear to have been carried out by as many as 1 million computers in 50 countries worldwide, apparently from rented botnets, networks of compromised computers coordinated for criminal purposes. Targets were government Web sites and portals, financial institutions, and news outlets.

The aim of the attacks seemed to be psychological impact rather than damage to physical infrastructure, and Aaviksoo characterized them as cyberterrorism rather than cyberwarfare. But the possibility of full-fledged cyberwar must be faced, he said.

“It is imminent that future development will see warfare in this newly born cyberspace,” he said. “The probability of that is rising over time.”

Cyberattacks in the present tense, Estonian says