英闻天下——239 US President May Have the Power to Order Preemptive Cyber Strikes

 　　The New York Times has reported that the Obama administration is expected to approve the policy in the coming weeks.

 

　　The newspaper said the new policy will also govern how US intelligence agencies can carry out searches of overseas computer networks for signs of potential attacks on the US.

 

　　And the policy says if the president approves, a counter attack will be carried out even if there is no declared war.

 

　　The new policy came as the US Department of Defense¹ approved a five-fold expansion of its cybersecurity force over the coming years in a bid to increase its ability to defend critical computer networks.

 

　　Jiang Qiping, chief editor of China Netweek, says interest groups in the US is hyping cyber security to get support.

 

　　"We are not ruling out the possibility that some people in the US are using this to get themselves more funding and attention."

 

　　Jiang Qiping says the new policy is also lacking legal support.

 

　　"US Defense Department has released a Cyber Security Strategy in 2011, which came up with the idea of active defence. This is to pave the way for the latest preemptive attacks. So far, there's no international law on this, Russia once hoped to have a international pact² to ban the use of cyberattacks for military purposes, but the US didn't sign the pact."

 

　　Li Yan, researcher with the Institute of American Studies at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, says the US government needs to address a number of issues before it can carry out such preemptive strikes.

 

　　"Cyber space is transnational, how are you able to pinpoint³ the hacker⁴ how are you going to find out who's behind the hacking⁵, is it an individual or a country? How are you going to make sure the attacks are not going to cause a meltdown of the cyber space? Unless the US is able to answer these questions, any of its counter cyber attacks will have huge consequences."

 

　　During the past week, the US media has also played up fresh rhetoric⁶ of a 'China threat' in cyberspace⁷.

 

　　It's being reported in the US that the New York Times, the publisher of the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post have all accused China of hacking their computers.

 

　　Jiang Qiping says US has never been able to provide enough evidence to back up its accusation⁸ against China.

 

　　IP addresses do not constitute sufficient evidence to confirm the origins of hackers⁹.

 

　　A study by an American cyber security company says the amount of computers being hacked¹⁰ in China accounts for 12 percent of the number in the world. And many of the hackers are operating in the US.

 

　　For CRI, I'm Su Yi.

1 defense   

n.防御，保卫；[pl.]防务工事；辩护，答辩

参考例句：

• The accused has the right to defense.被告人有权获得辩护。
• The war has impacted the area with military and defense workers.战争使那个地区挤满了军队和防御工程人员。

2 pact   

n.合同，条约，公约，协定

参考例句：

• The two opposition parties made an electoral pact.那两个反对党订了一个有关选举的协定。
• The trade pact between those two countries came to an end.那两国的通商协定宣告结束。

3 pinpoint   

vt.准确地确定；用针标出…的精确位置

参考例句：

• It is difficult to pinpoint when water problems of the modern age began.很难准确地指出，现代用水的问题是什么时候出现的。
• I could pinpoint his precise location on a map.我能在地图上指明他的准确位置。

4 hacker   

n.能盗用或偷改电脑中信息的人，电脑黑客

参考例句：

• The computer hacker wrote that he was from Russia.这个计算机黑客自称他来自俄罗斯。
• This site was attacked by a hacker last week.上周这个网站被黑客攻击了。

5 hacking   

n.非法访问计算机系统和数据库的活动

参考例句：

• The patient with emphysema is hacking all day. 这个肺气肿病人整天不断地干咳。
• We undertook the task of hacking our way through the jungle. 我们负责在丛林中开路。

6 rhetoric   

n.修辞学，浮夸之言语

参考例句：

• Do you know something about rhetoric?你懂点修辞学吗？
• Behind all the rhetoric,his relations with the army are dangerously poised.在冠冕堂皇的言辞背后，他和军队的关系岌岌可危。

7 cyberspace   

n.虚拟信息空间，网络空间，计算机化世界

参考例句：

• She travels in cyberspace by sending messages to friends around the world.她利用电子空间给世界各地的朋友们发送信件。
• The teens spend more time in cyberspace than in the real world of friends and family.青少年花费在电脑上的时间比他们和真正的朋友及家人在一起的时间要多。

8 accusation   

n.控告，指责，谴责

参考例句：

• I was furious at his making such an accusation.我对他的这种责备非常气愤。
• She knew that no one would believe her accusation.她知道没人会相信她的指控。

9 hackers   

n.计算机迷( hacker的名词复数 )；私自存取或篡改电脑资料者，电脑“黑客”

参考例句：

• They think of viruses that infect an organization from the outside.They envision hackers breaking into their information vaults. 他们考虑来自外部的感染公司的病毒，他们设想黑客侵入到信息宝库中。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Arranging a meeting with the hackers took weeks againoff-again email exchanges. 通过几星期电子邮件往来安排见面，他们最终同意了。 来自互联网

10 hacked   

生气

参考例句：

• I hacked the dead branches off. 我把枯树枝砍掉了。
• I'm really hacked off. 我真是很恼火。