06.14.13
Cyberwar Shoeshine Drill
Quantum Dawn 2 is coming to Wall Street.
No, it’s not a video game or a bad zombie movie; it’s a simulated cyber attack to prepare banks, brokerages and exchanges for what has become an ever-bigger risk to their earnings and operations.
Organized by the trade group SIFMA, Quantum Dawn 2 will take place on June 28 – a summer Friday that, with any luck, will be a relatively quiet day in the real markets.The drill involves not just big Wall Street firms like Citigroup and Bank of America, but the Department of Homeland Security, the Treasury Department, the Federal Reserve, the Securities and Exchange Commission, according to SIFMA officials.
The drill, run by an ex-Marine who went to work for Goldman Sachs, aims to simulate attacks on the “equity markets.”
Failure of which, everyone knows, would bring the US to a screeching halt.
Naturally, it’s also a way to raise money on a service of no social good to anyone except the people collecting the price of the tickets.
“About 40 firms will participate in the operation, having paid fees of $1,000, $5,000 or $10,000 depending on the size of their revenue … Each firm must send three executives: one from business continuity, one from information security, another from operations whose job is to keep trading, settlement and clearance running during market crises,” informs Reuters.
“A firm called Cyber Strategies, which works with the Department of Homeland Security on cyber threats, will receive the fees for overseeing the exercise.”
Here you have it, folks. The ultimate in cyberwar shoeshine, the servant class of the one percent, in collaboration with the Department of Homeland Security, for an inside circle jerk that asks you to swallow the idea that the most important thing now is protecting “equity markets” on Wall Street. From the hordes of cyber-enemies who have figured out all that’s needed to kneecap America is to cause “unusual slowness, in trading, or [have] viruses trying to invade the systems.”
“The [market players] will also have to call one another to figure out what’s going on.”
On the other side of the coin, the majority of Americans would still like protection from Wall Street.
“I don’t like you. Fat. Wealthy. Think you understand pain.” — Rorschach, Watchmen.
Christoph Hechl said,
June 14, 2013 at 11:27 pm
Personally i wouldn’t knowlingly let anybody working for Goldman Sachs near any computer or network that i run.
Seeing that most of the things that were once considered conspiracy theories have in hindsight been true, i tend to see those people as the ultimate evil.
George Smith said,
June 15, 2013 at 10:34 am
You’ve hit it. The culture of Goldman Sachs is one that trains its people to take money off rubes. So this fellow, and his trade association, hit upon the idea of charging 10k a ticket for a phony exercise that lasts half a day. Easy money having nothing to do with the real world. Whoah, boys, trading is slow today! And now we just got an e-mail warning that Chinese cyberwarriors have taken over computers at the Fed and the Mint and billions of dollars of purple — PURPLE — money is being printed.
What’s a special travesty is that this has the cooperation of the US government, or at least the appearance of it.
Michael said,
June 17, 2013 at 3:49 pm
Will the exercise simulate insider threats, you know, the kind of insider threat that crippled the economy in 2008? It really should.
George Smith said,
June 17, 2013 at 4:33 pm
Oh, now you’ve said something naughty. Will it simulate someone copying stuff out on a thumb drive?
Anyway, in a meta issue — you may have noticed your comment went right through. If you’ve had a comment approved before, I’ve switched things to green-lighting any that come after. We’ll see how it works. I’m far from convinced of error-less implementation.