Cyberwarfare and the Tallinn Manual

Study Notes

Cyberwarfare is becoming more subtle and dangerous, not just about hacking power stations.
Estonia played a key role in its emergence and evolution, first as a victim, now as a leader in thinking about how digital battles will develop.
Estonia has around 1.3 million people, borders Latvia and Russia, and regained independence in 1991 after the Soviet Union.
Estonia has invested heavily in digital services, such as internet voting and electronic tax filing, underpinned by a digital signature infrastructure.
Estonia experienced a large-scale cyberattack in 2007. Plans for a Soviet war memorial were attacked via denial of service attacks.
This demonstrated the real-world consequences of a purely digital attack.

The Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (CDCOE) was created to help prevent further digital attacks and better understand warfare in the digital age.
The Tallinn Manual (2013) is a set of 95 rules to define cyberwarfare on the internet, including online attacks that could be considered an "armed attack".
The manual doesn't ignore existing international law, but shows how it applies to cyber warfare.
An online attack can be equivalent to an armed attack if it causes physical harm.
Other cyberattacks, like breaking into a military system, count as "serious attacks", while minor hacks might not be considered a use of force.
The manual also discusses more complex scenarios like preemptive attacks, in which one country attacks another country's oil pipeline by hacking the system.
The manual also considers the legality of situations, such as taking control of enemy drones which have to be grounded with insignia before being used. (Example of a debatable situation).
The manual does not delve into simple cyberattacks (ie, trolling, spam etc...).

Cyberwarfare is not just about breaking in and stealing data.
It is becoming about denial of reality, through propaganda and disinformation.
State-sponsored hackers often work through third parties and proxies, not directly.
The impact is larger than the attack area, having a wider effect in other countries and across borders.
Tactics include: hacking, denial of service, disinformation, misinformation.
This is happening all over the world and has been happening for years.
Estonia and Ukraine are recent examples, but not the only ones, of this type of warfare.