Why Information Integrity Attacks Pose New Security Challenges

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rgMekanic

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DARKReading has posted an interesting article today, focusing on the new and growing threat of attackers using botnets to flood comment sections in a tactic called skewing. The attacks purpose is exactly what it sounds like, to skew public opinion,

I am glad someone is touching on this, as with the nature of public opinion today, this could be a massive problem across nearly every issue you can think of. A good quote would be "If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it." Except these lies could be spread by a nearly infinite amount of "people."

If left unchecked, these bots will steadily erode human users' trust in anything they see on the Web. Given how easy it is to impersonate human behaviors, how popular will the most popular stories in your feed be, really? Does the song that's topping the charts of your favorite streaming service or the latest viral video really have that many plays? Is the metric that's guiding your company's decisions based in anything real or the work of some unseen manipulator hiding in the shadows?
 
Government agencies should only solicit opinions from phone calls or hand written letters with return addresses. Cross check the return addresses.
 
Similar tactics have been common fare for years in the ad clicks for pay business. A lot of companies are dialing back their 'targeted' ads budget because when they did their own research on clicks = increased sales, they found much of their money was wasted on bot clicked ads.
 
Don't forget the snafu with IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes on movie reviews. Don't trust anything with a rating on the web! ;)
 
10/10 best game/movie ever!

i forsee a real end to the comments and board sections itself , which disables any questioning and criticism of the content. How many times have you scrolled fast down to the comments section to get the real news?
 
This is just practice for when the bots become sentient and actually care about such stuff...then businesses and government will have to cater to their wishes or face the consequences. Human opinion will be a drop in the bucket...well that part seems taken care of already.
 
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