Tag Archives: war

21 November 2023
1 Comment
AI, Devices, Security

Technology in the War in Ukraine

Reading Time: 3 minutes

The war in Ukraine is a stark reminder of the potential for technology to be used for both good and evil. On the one hand, technology is being used to help people in a variety of ways, such as providing humanitarian assistance, connecting loved ones, and documenting war crimes. On the other hand, technology is also being used to harm people, such as carrying out airstrikes, delivering supplies to Russian forces, and spreading disinformation.

How technology is harming people

  • Drones: Drones are being used to carry out airstrikes on civilian targets, killing and injuring innocent people. For example, in March 2022, a Russian drone strike on a maternity hospital in Mariupol killed three people, including a pregnant woman and her child.
  • Robots: Robots are being used to clear minefields, defuse explosives, and evacuate civilians. However, there have been reports of robots being used to carry out attacks on civilians. For example, in April 2022, a Russian robot was reported to have opened fire on a group of civilians in Bucha.
  • Cyberwarfare: Cyberwarfare tactics are being used to disrupt communications, steal data, and launch denial-of-service attacks. These attacks can have a devastating impact on civilians, disrupting access to essential services and causing widespread economic damage. For example, in February 2022, a Russian cyberattack on Ukraine’s banking system caused widespread outages.

How technology is helping people

  • Humanitarian assistance: Technology is being used to provide humanitarian assistance to people affected by the war. For example, the World Food Programme is using drones to deliver food and other essential supplies to people in besieged areas.
  • Connecting loved ones: Technology is helping people to connect with loved ones who have been separated by the war. For example, the Red Cross is providing free phone calls and video chats to people who have been displaced by the conflict.
  • Documenting war crimes: Technology is being used to document war crimes and human rights abuses. For example, the Bellingcat investigative group is using social media footage and other open-source information to identify and track Russian war criminals.

Where tech in this war is heading

The war in Ukraine is driving technological innovation, as both sides are developing new weapons and tactics. For example, Russia is developing new types of drones, including kamikaze drones that can fly into targets and explode. Ukraine is developing new ways to counter Russian drones, such as using electronic warfare systems to disable them.

What tech will look like for future wars?

The war in Ukraine is a glimpse into the future of warfare, where technology will play an increasingly important role. In future wars, we can expect to see more use of drones, robots, and cyberwarfare. We may also see the development of new technologies, such as artificial intelligence-powered weapons that can make their own decisions about who to kill.

Other related news

Social media platforms are being used to spread disinformation and propaganda on both sides of the war in Ukraine. Russian and Ukrainian government agencies, as well as independent media outlets and individuals, are using social media to share information about the war. However, some of this information is inaccurate or misleading.

For example, Russian officials have used social media to spread false claims that the Ukrainian government is committing genocide against Russian speakers in Ukraine. Ukrainian officials have also used social media to spread false claims that the Russian military is using chemical weapons in Ukraine.

Both the Russian and Ukrainian militaries are using facial recognition technology to track and identify their opponents. Facial recognition technology can be used to identify individuals in photos and videos, even if they are wearing masks or other disguises.

For example, the Russian military is using facial recognition technology to identify Ukrainian soldiers and civilians who have been captured. The Ukrainian military is using facial recognition technology to identify Russian soldiers who have committed war crimes.

Conclusion

The war in Ukraine is a reminder of the potential for technology to be used for both good and evil. It is important to be aware of how technology is being used in the war, both to harm and to help people. We must also be prepared for the future of warfare, where technology will play an increasingly important role.

https://ecfr.eu/publication/star-tech-enterprise-emerging-technologies-in-russias-war-on-ukraine/

https://www.euronews.com/next/2023/09/27/drones-and-robots-how-the-ukraine-war-is-driving-technological-innovation

https://www.economist.com/europe/2023/10/29/trenches-and-tech-on-ukraines-southern-front

https://therecord.media/ukraine-russia-ministry-of-digital-transformation-brave1-interview-bornyakov

https://www.ft.com/content/1d2f0389-6e05-48e1-bf6a-51fb65a28d03

Engine used: Google Bard

I prompted Google Bard by asking it firstly about current events. The wars taking place are very prevalent issues and many articles highlight the technology used. It didn’t take long before this AI engine was able to produce information about the wars and different perspectives on the destructive technologies.

Tagged , , , ,
26 October 2022
1 Comment
Bez kategorii

HOW DRONES BECAME AN INTEGRAL PART OF THE WAR

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or unmanned aircraft systems well known to us as “drones”. These generally small devices are basically flying machines remotely controlled by people or programmed robots to fly autonomously using software in its embedded systems connected  with onboard sensors and a global positioning system (GPS). They are most often associated with industries such as defence, Military Warfare and in many others related to war. At the beginning they were mostly used for intelligence gathering, anti-aircraft target practice and as weapons platforms. These days drones are both valuable to civilians and military units and their popularity is increasing because of their utility, fast production  and growing affordability which is very relevant in hostilities.

Imaginative and smart use of drones by Ukraine

Using of drones has considerably  changed defence and counterinsurgency operations around the world. For a long time drones are delivered for wars, for example Turkish drones had extremely important impact on war between Azerbaijan and Armenia in 2020.It’s important to mention that these drones were powerful, massive, expensive and not that easy to produce. Contrary to them,  the Ukrainian army focused on the production of cheap, plastic, equipped airplanes with devices that can drop objects such as grenades and bombs. Most of these drones were manufactured in workshops throughout Ukraine by people with their own hands. This process wasn’t very demanding and certainly provides enormous advantages. Despite having powerful military drones, majority of bulk of its drone fleet consists of these drones intended for smaller activities such us spoting artillery targets or dropping anti-tank munitions. It created posibility to overcome Russia’s advantage in artillery and tanks.

Russia’s ‘kamikaze’ drone attacking Ukraine

Russia was first suspected by Ukraine of using a drone well known as the Iranian-made Shahed-136 in order to attack civilians. It’s really dangerous machine constructed to follow the target until it is instructed to attack and it’s hard to detect. These drones have been spotted in many places in Ukraine. They are significantly cheaper than cruise missiles, which makes them profitable. Ukrainian armies have managed to intercept a large part of these drones, but they are  difficult to intercept and are more difficult to defeat by air defense.

How drones are being used and who is supplying them?

CURIOSITIES AND FACTS REFERING TO THE VIDEO :

  • Russia is buying shahed military drones from Iran
  • Us Is supplying drones to Ukraine
  • Elon Musk ‘SpaceX is providing starlink satellite communication system to Ukraine
  • DJI has now stopped its supply of drones to Russia and Ukraine
  • Global drones academy was training the troops

Summing up…

In summary, the development of drone-related technology is extremely important these days and provides great opportunities, whether in a war or in everyday life. Certainly, companies specializing in this field will have a significant impact on the functioning of our world .Hopefully in the right direction..

What do you think?

Sources:

1.https://www.bbc.com/news/world-62225830

2.https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/10/world/europe/ukraine-drones.html

3.https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-62048403

Tagged , ,
2 December 2018
Leave a comment
Bez kategorii

50 000 Printers hacked in order to prolong PewDiePie’s number one spot on YouTube.

Reading Time: 3 minutes

Felix Kjellberg, a swedish YouTuber known as PewDiePie, is in the middle of a “YouTube subscribers war” where the prize is the number on spot considering the amount of subscribers on a channel. The war is fought between him and T-Series, an Indian media company which does bollywood music videos. Right now T-Series is the fastest growing channel on YouTube and has the number one spot regarding video views.

We’ve seen lots of posts, tweets, videos with people preaching the message of helping Felix remain the number one by subscribing to him, we’ve even had another YouTuber buy billboards to spread the message.

But this is like nothing before. Twitter user known as TheHackerGiraffe has found an exploit that enabled him to hack 50 thousand printers. First words about it came from twitter where people thought it was actually PewDiePie’s propaganda. PewDiePie took a bit of hate to the face because of this, but not enough to affect him – it’s not the first time and not the last time he gets bullied.

 

Because of this event the subscriber war took a twist and PewDiePie is still number one but not for long since T-Series is growing 4 times quicker. Here’s a live sub counter from YouTube provided by FlareTV

A bit about the technical side of the “hack”.

“TheHackerGiraffe scanned the Internet to find the list of vulnerable printers with port 9100 open using Shodan, a search engine for internet-connected devices and exploited them to spew out a message.

The hacker mainly uses an open-source hacking tool to exploit vulnerable printers, called Printer Exploitation Toolkit (PRET), which has been designed for testing printers against various known vulnerabilities, allowing attackers to capture or manipulate print jobs.”

The Hacker News

Apparently this is more of a trick than a hack. It’s not very complicated and it’s already been done by a hacker called Weev in 2016 in order to broaden antisemitism and by another hacker in 2017 who just printed silly drawings on around 150 000 printers.

TheHackerGiraffe in his AMA on reddit claimed that he hacked only 50 000 out of 800 000 potential printers that are still exposed to attacks. In perspective, that’s a lot of printers to be used in a bad way like phishing, blackmailing or just simply abusing it. It shows how insecure IPP/LPD printers are – especially when they’re not up-to-date. To somehow portray how easy this attack may be TheHackerGiffare wrote:

Think of it as a giant print button on the internet.

Having this power in his hands our “Friendly Giraffe” instead of abusing it he decided to help a YouTuber he liked and out of all the options he had – he decided to send the following message:

It’s a good way to raise awareness about security. This trick could have cost companies a lot of money since ink and paper doesn’t come for free. On top of that a trick like that could be pulled off by a kid and they could suffer consequences because of that. It is said that all a hacker need is your Fax number to hack your printer. At the end of the day a fun little game of a subscriber war has thought us a lesson about our security.

S:
https://thehackernews.com/2018/11/pewdiepie-printer-hack.html
https://www.zdnet.com/article/twitter-user-hacks-50000-printers-to-tell-people-to-subscribe-to-pewdiepie/
https://www.reddit.com/r/AMA/comments/a1wo96/i_hacked_50000_printers_worldwide_out_of/
twitter
Tagged , , , , , , ,