News & Opinion on Terrorism & Strategic Communication — September 16, 2007

U.S. Strategic Communication Stuck in Cold War Mindset. “In large part this failure of public diplomacy is the product of an inappropriately designed approach, based almost exclusively as it was on the concept that governed Washington’s media and propaganda campaign targeting the socialist bloc during the Cold War.” (al-Ahram, 9/13).

Saudi Suicide Bomber Tricked by AQ. “They told me to take it to an address in Baghdad. As soon as I got there the truck exploded.” (CNN, 9/14).

And Lots of Buzz about Chinese Cyber Attacks…

Chinese Cyber-attacks: Not just for Wartime Anymore?. “At previous conferences and seminars on this subject, Chinese military experts have put forward the concept that information warfare should include a peacetime “information struggle” in the political, diplomatic, financial, cultural and economic areas.” (UPI Asia Online, 9/14).

Uptick in Stories is Suspicious “That several stories are leaking out, with similar elements, suggests that there may be some kind of political positioning also going on — the stories are being released to create leverage in some other situation.” (TaoSecurity, 9/14)

Open Source Creates Risk “With public utilities such as Hydro-electric plants and nuclear power plants moving away from proprietary (and more secure) systems toward open standards based systems that use common Internet protocols such as TCP/IP to connect to one another, the list of potential targets is increasing.” (Ottumwa Shaman, 9/13).