>> Paper: "Yet the world is doing remarkably well overall, and has not suffered any of the oft-threatened giant digital catastrophes." > HN: This paper is the

>> Paper: "Yet the world is doing remarkably well overall, and has not suffered any of the oft-threatened giant digital catastrophes." > HN: This paper is the antivax argument, but for tech. If there was no major digital disaster that does not means that it cannot happen. No, it's not what the author was saying. I found the paper is advocating a different position. > Paper: This essay does not claim that a “digital Pearl Harbor” will not take place. One, or more, almost surely will. But that has to be viewed in perspective. Given our inability to build secure system, such events are bound happen in any case. So all we can affect is their frequency and severity, just as with large physical dangers. Further, the likelihood of a“digital Pearl Harbor” has to be considered in comparison to all the other threats we face. The issue is risk management, deciding how much resources to devote to various areas. I completely disagree with the main thesis of the paper, but I think this perspective is interesting. It seems the author is using an approach towards network security similar to, say, industrial safety or terrorist attacks: I think everyone at here is familiar with the criticism from cryptographers like Bruce Schneier on terrorist attacks: locking down the streets or putting armed forces and increasingly ridiculous lists of banned goods at airports is mainly a security theater. If a terrorist decided to destroy something, literally everything, from a bus, a market, a train station, an airplane or a park, etc, can be a target. Imagining a movie plot of terrorists attacking a particular target, and putting that target under a ton of superficial security measures is not meaningful for security in the real world. It seems the author thinks most online attacks work in a similar way. I think it's an interesting, debatable perspective. What do you think about it?