The United States has one of the most powerful information infrastructures in the world. That being said, the Russians have been known to use information warfare for a long time, probably since the internet became available to them. The Russians invented Tetris, which was a big hit around the world, which is somewhat how I think about Russians when it comes to information warfare. The Russians are known for commencing information warfare attacks in what is known as the “grey area”. The grey area is the part of information warfare that does not have any known laws that apply to international affairs concerning information warfare. There are sanctions that are placed on countries and that is pretty much as far as it goes with international affairs that concern information warfare. So what can the United States do in an effort to broaden their influence on information warfare? Legislative measures are what needs to be taken to prevent the other super powerful countries from committing acts of information warfare.
When laws are made and actually taken into consideration about cyber crimes then the United States will be able to prevent cyber attacks. Russia is known to boast about their interference in elections and espionage behavior. They carried out an attack on Estonia to cripple their networks when they tried to remove a Soviet era memorial. There was nothing that any other countries could do about it because there are not any international laws put in place about cyber crimes. Is the rest of the world waiting for America to step in and take care of the other super power countries use of information warfare? The other countries in the world are probably waiting for the international legislation to substantiate in the favor of the United States stepping in and resolving cyber criminal’s activity when using information warfare tactics. Russia is so advanced at information warfare using propaganda, disinformation, and spying on other countries that there needs to be some sort of measures that can be taken to prevent them from using information warfare.
The United States of America needs to work on a response to information warfare attacks not just on the United States but also on any country in the world that would seem less information infastructurally advanced. We will just have to work for years and years on international laws to be able to enforce actions on adversaries and any other cyber criminal countries. Everything seems to be on an international type of peaceful platform when it comes to warfare with guns and physical weapons of war, but the information warfare abilities has pretty much just begun. We are in a new era of propaganda and other ways to influence the public opinion and Russia seems to be ahead of the game when it comes to these information warfare tactics.