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War Doesn’t Just Break Things. It Accelerates Everything.
Technology evolves faster. Alliances shift. Supply chains splinter and reform. Finance becomes a weapon. Policy loses its footing in principle. The ripple effects reach every corner of the globe—and no sector feels the impact more acutely than cybersecurity.
Because in this new era, cybersecurity isn’t just part of the story; it is the story.
Every community. Every business. Every industry. No one is insulated from the cyber threats and consequences they bring.
The cybersecurity industry and the markets it protects are doing cartwheels to keep up—but the deeper risks often go unnoticed.
Let’s talk about the quieter, more insidious ways cyberwar is reshaping business, and why every organization needs to rethink its defenses—now.
Where Cybercrime Ends and Cyberwar Begins? It Doesn’t.
Once upon a time, hackers chased notoriety. Mischief. Status. Today? It’s all business. Professionally run crime rings, complete with supply chains, development pipelines, and yes—state sponsorship.
Not every player in that chain is a criminal. But enough are. And they don’t operate in the shadows alone; they’re aided by safe harbors, political blind spots, and in some cases, direct state involvement. Quiet alliances between governments, financial systems, and even legitimate companies provide a backbone for global cyber operations. These aren’t isolated acts; they’re engineered outcomes.
We’ve Always Been at War—We Just Didn’t Call It That.
Cybersecurity has wartime origins, from signal intelligence in WWII to surveillance in the Cold War. But today’s adversaries aren’t playing by traditional rules. Cybercrime didn’t start as a financial weapon or political tool, but it’s been claimed by both.
Now it’s embedded in the global trade matrix. Like 18th-century British-sanctioned piracy that disrupted Spanish treasure routes, modern actors use ransomware and espionage to disrupt economies, test infrastructure, and exert pressure—with just enough ambiguity to maintain plausible deniability.
Think It Won’t Affect You? It Already Has.
Whether it’s NotPetya, Colonial Pipeline, or SolarWinds, the lines between criminal and political motives have blurred beyond recognition. Every ransomware attack, every breach, every nation-state probe—is a shot fired in a larger, invisible conflict.
Even open-source software libraries have become backdoors to national infrastructure.
We once believed the battlefield was somewhere else. Now, it’s your codebase. Your supply chain. Your cloud environment. Your business.
Risk Isn’t a Possibility. It’s a Constant.
Risk can be documented. Quantified. Mitigated. But most importantly—it must be acknowledged.
I recall a client referred to us by a large financial institution. They’d just secured a DOD contract and immediately saw a spike in malicious scans from Chinese IPs. Despite a well-staffed IT team, they knew they couldn’t face that level of risk alone.
That wasn’t a coincidence. That was fallout from cyberwar. So, they partnered with us, adding MDR capabilities to strengthen their resilience.
And they adapted accordingly.
If You’re Connected, You’re at Battle. Any endpoint. Any cloud instance. Any data processor you trust—is part of the attack surface. Even if you don’t see yourself as a target.
So, build your infosec program like a battle plan. Account for the risks of cyber conflict. Include them in your registers. Test your defenses. And mitigate what you can—because ignorance isn’t insulation.
This isn’t about paranoia. It’s about preparedness.
References
https://www.csis.org/programs/strategic-technologies-program/significant-cyber-incidents
https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/iranian-backed-hackers-work-after-us-strikes-123181992
https://press.un.org/en/2024/sc15891.doc.htm
https://www.cato.org/policy-analysis/revising-bank-secrecy-act-protect-privacy-deter-criminals
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonial_Pipeline_ransomware_attack