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Introduction:

This Op-ed sheds light on the perspectives of the US and China regarding cyber espionage. Additionally, it seeks to analyze China's response to the US accusation regarding cyber espionage.

What is Cyber espionage?

Cyber espionage or cyber spying is the act of obtaining personal, sensitive, or proprietary information from individuals without their knowledge or consent. In an increasingly transparent and technological society, the ability to control the private information an individual reveals on the Internet and the ability of others to access that information are a growing concern. This includes storage and retrieval of e-mail by third parties, social media, search engines, data mining, GPS tracking, the explosion of smartphone usage, and many other technology considerations. In the age of big data, there is a growing concern for privacy issues surrounding the storage and misuse of personal data and non-consensual mining of private information by companies, criminals, and governments. 

Cyber espionage aims for economic, political, and technological gain. Fox example Stuxnet (2010) cyber-attack by the US and its allies Israel against Iran’s Nuclear facilities. Three espionage tools were discovered connected to Stuxnet, such as Gauss, FLAME and DuQu, for stealing data such as passwords, screenshots, Bluetooth, Skype functions, etc.

Cyber espionage is one of the most significant and intriguing international challenges globally. Many nations and international bodies, such as the US and China, have created their definitions and have always struggled over cyber espionage norms.

The US Perspective

In 2009, US officials (along with other allied countries) mentioned that cyber espionage was acceptable if it safeguarded national security, although they condemned economically motivated cyber espionage. Even the Director of National Intelligence said in 2013 that foreign intelligence capabilities cannot steal foreign companies' trade secrets to benefit their firms. This stance is consistent with the Economic Espionage Act (EEA) of 1996, particularly Section 1831, which prohibits economic espionage. This includes the theft of a trade secret that "will benefit any foreign government, foreign agent or foreign instrumentality. 

Second, the US advocates for cybersecurity market standards and strongly opposes transferring personal data extracted from the US Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to cybercrime markets. Furthermore, China has been reported to sell OPM data on illicit markets. It became a grave concern for the US government when the Chinese government managed to acquire sensitive details of 22.1 million US government workers through cyber intrusions in 2014.

Third, Cyber-espionage is acceptable unless it’s utilized for Doxing, which involves disclosing personal information about someone online without their consent and using it as a tool for political influence operations. However, Western academics and scholars have endeavoured to distinguish between doxing and whistleblowing. They argue that whistleblowing, exemplified by events like the Snowden Leaks and Vault 7 disclosures, serves the interests of US citizens. In the US, being regarded as an open society, certain disclosures are not promoted but rather required by mandate.

Fourth, the US argues that there is no cyber espionage against critical infrastructure during peacetime. According to the US, there are 16 critical infrastructure sectors, including chemical, nuclear, energy, defence, food, water, and so on. These sectors are considered essential to the US, and any disruption or harm would impact security, national public health and national economic security.

The US concern regarding China’s cyber espionage

According to James Lewis (a senior vice president at the Center for US-China Economic and Security Review Commission), the US faces losses between $ 20 billion and $30 billion annually due to China’s cyberespionage. The 2018 U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Section 301 report highlighted instances, where the Chinese government and executives from Chinese companies engaged in clandestine cyber intrusions to obtaining commercially valuable information from the U.S. businesses, such as in 2018 where officials from China’s Ministry of State Security, stole trade from General Electric aviation and other aerospace companies.    

China's response to the US accusations of cyber espionage

China's perspective on cyber espionage is outlined by its 2014 anti-espionage law, which was revised in 2023. Article 1 of this legislation is formulated to prevent, halt, and punish espionage actions to maintain national security. Article 4 addresses the act of espionage and does not differentiate between state-sponsored cyber espionage for economic purposes and state-sponsored cyber espionage for national security purposes. However, China doesn't make a clear difference between government-to-government hacking (spying) and government-to-corporate sector hacking, unlike the US. This distinction is less apparent in China due to its strong state-owned enterprise (SOE) sector. However, military spying is considered part of the national interest in the US, while corporate spying is considered a crime.

China asserts that the US has established cyber norms concerning cyber espionage to normalize public attribution as acceptable conduct. This is achieved by targeting China for cyber operations, imposing sanctions on accused Chinese individuals, and making political accusations, such as blaming China and Russia for meddling in US elections. Despite all this, Washington D.C has never taken responsibility for the infamous Flame and Stuxnet cyber operations, which were widely recognized as part of a broader collaborative initiative known as Operation Olympic Games between the US and Israel. Additionally, the US takes the lead in surveillance activities conducted against China, Russia, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the United Nations (UN) Secretary-General, and several French presidents. Surveillance programs such as Irritant Horn, Stellar Wind, Bvp47, the Hive, and PRISM are recognized as tools used by the US to monitor both allies and adversaries to maintain global hegemony.

China urges the US to cease its smear campaign associated with Volt Typhoon’s cyberattack for cyber espionage, citing the publication of a report titled “Volt Typhoon: A Conspiratorial Swindling Campaign Targets with U.S. Congress and Taxpayers Conducted by U.S. Intelligence Community” by China's National Computer Virus Emergency Response Centre and the 360 Digital Security Group on 15 April. According to the report, 'Volt Typhoon' is a ransomware cyber criminal group self-identified as the 'Dark Power' and is not affiliated with any state or region. Multiple cybersecurity authorities in the US collaborated to fabricate this story just for more budgets from Congress. In the meantime, Microsoft and other U.S. cybersecurity firms are seeking more big contracts from US cybersecurity authorities. The reality behind “Volt Typhoon '' is a conspiratorial swindling campaign to achieve two objectives by amplifying the "China threat theory" and cheating money from the U.S. Congress and taxpayers.

Beijing condemned the US claims of cyber espionage without any solid evidence. China also blames the US for economic espionage by citing the European Parliament report that the National Security Agency (NSA) was also involved in assisting Boeing in beating Airbus for a multi-billion dollar contract. Furthermore, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff also accused the US authorities of spying against the state-owned oil company “Petrobras” for economic reasons.

Conclusion

In 2015, the US and China marked a milestone as both President Xi Jinping and Barack Obama signed an agreement, committing that neither country's government would conduct or knowingly support cyber-enabled theft of trade secrets, intellectual property, or other confidential business information to grant competitive advantages to firms or commercial sectors. However, the China Cybersecurity Industry Alliance (CCIA) published a report titled 'US Threats and Sabotage to the Security and Development of Global Cyberspace' in 2024, highlighting the US escalating cyber-attack and espionage activities against China and other nations. Additionally, there has been a considerable increase in the volume and sophistication of Chinese hacking since 2016. According to a survey by the Center for International and Strategic Studies, out of 224 cyber espionage incidents reported since 2000, 69% occurred after Xi assumed office. Therefore, China and the US must address cybersecurity issues through dialogue and cooperation, utilizing bilateral and multilateral agreements.

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Introduction

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on 20th August 2024 issued directives requiring Access Service Providers to adhere to the specific guidelines to protect consumer interests and prevent fraudulent activities.  TRAI has mandated all Access Service Providers to abide by the directives. These steps advance TRAI's efforts to promote a secure messaging ecosystem, protecting consumer interests and eliminating fraudulent conduct.

Key Highlights of the TRAI’s Directives

• For improved monitoring and control, TRAI has directed that Access Service Providers move telemarketing calls, beginning with the 140 series, to an online DLT (Digital Ledger Technology) platform by September 30, 2024, at the latest. 
• All Access Service Providers will be forbidden from sending messages that contain URLs, APKs, OTT links, or callback numbers that the sender has not whitelisted, the rule is to be effective from September 1st, 2024.
• In an effort to improve message traceability, TRAI has made it mandatory for all messages, starting on November 1, 2024, to include a traceable trail from sender to receiver. Any message with an undefined or mismatched telemarketer chain will be rejected.
• To discourage the exploitation or misuse of templates for promotional content, TRAI has introduced punitive actions in case of non-compliance. Content Templates registered in the wrong category will be banned, and subsequent offences will result in a one-month suspension of the Sender's services.
• To assure compliance with rules, all Headers and Content Templates registered on DLT must follow the requirements. Furthermore, a single Content Template cannot be connected to numerous headers.
• If any misuse of headers or content templates by a sender is discovered, TRAI has instructed an immediate ‘suspension of traffic’ from all of that sender's headers and content templates for their verification. Such suspension can only be revoked only after the Sender has taken legal action against such usage. Furthermore, Delivery-Telemarketers must identify and disclose companies guilty of such misuse within two business days, or else risk comparable repercussions.

CyberPeace Policy Outlook

TRAI’s measures are aimed at curbing the misuse of messaging services including spam. TRAI has mandated that headers and content templates follow defined requirements. Punitive actions are introduced in case of non-compliance with the directives, such as blacklisting and service suspension. TRAI’s measures will surely curb the increasing rate of scams such as phishing, spamming, and other fraudulent activities and ultimately protect consumer's interests and establish a true cyber-safe environment in messaging services ecosystem.

The official text of TRAI directives is available on the official website of TRAI or you can access the link here.

References

1. https://www.trai.gov.in/sites/default/files/Direction_20082024.pdf
2. https://www.trai.gov.in/sites/default/files/PR_No.53of2024.pdf
3. https://pib.gov.in/PressReleaseIframePage.aspx?PRID=2046872
4. https://legal.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/regulators/trai-issues-directives-to-access-providers-to-curb-misuse-fraud-through-messaging/112669368

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Over the last decade, battlefields have percolated from mountains, deserts, jungles, seas, and the skies into the invisible networks of code and cables. Cyberwarfare is no longer a distant possibility but today’s reality. The cyberattacks of Estonia in 2007, the crippling of Iran’s nuclear program by the Stuxnet virus, the SolarWinds and Colonial Pipeline breaches in recent years have proved one thing: that nations can now paralyze economies and infrastructures without firing a bullet.  Cyber operations now fall beyond the traditional threshold of war, allowing aggressors to exploit the grey zone where full-scale retaliation may be unlikely. 

At the same time, this ambiguity has also given rise to the concept of cyber deterrence. It is a concept that has been borrowed from the nuclear strategies during the Cold War era and has been adapted to the digital age. At the core, cyber deterrence seeks to alter the adversary’s cost-benefit calculation that makes attacks either too costly or pointless to pursue. While power blocs like the US, Russia, and China continue to build up their cyber arsenals, smaller nations can hold unique advantages, most importantly in terms of their resilience, if not firepower.   

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Understanding the concept of Cyber Deterrence

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Deterrence, in its classic sense, is about preventing action through the fear of consequences. It usually manifests in four mechanisms as follows:

• Punishment by threatening to impose costs on attackers, whether by counter-attacks, economic sanctions, or even conventional forces. 
• Denial of attacks by making them futile through hardened defences, and ensuring the systems to resist, recover, and continue to function. 
• Entanglement by leveraging interdependence in trade, finance, and technology to make attacks costly for both attackers and defenders. 
• Norms can also help shape behaviour by stigmatizing reckless cyber actions by imposing reputational costs that can exceed any gains. 

However, great powers have always emphasized the importance of punishment as a tool to showcase their power by employing offensive cyber arsenals to instill psychological pressure on their rivals. Yet in cyberspace, punishment has inherent flaws. 

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The Advantage of Asymmetry 

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For small states,  smaller geographical size can be utilised as a benefit. Three advantages of this exist, such as:

• With fewer critical infrastructures to protect,  resources can be concentrated. For example, Denmark, with a modest population of $40 million cyber budget, is considered to be among the most cyber-secure nations, despite receiving billions of US spending.  
• Smaller bureaucracies enable faster response. The centralised cyber command of Singapore allows it to ensure a rapid coordination between the government and the private sector. 
• Smaller countries with lesser populations can foster a higher public awareness and participation in cyber hygiene by amplifying national resilience.  

In short, defending a small digital fortress can be easier than securing a sprawling empire of interconnected systems. 

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Lessons from Estonia and Singapore 

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The 2007 crisis of Estonia remains a case study of cyber resilience. Although its government, bank, and media were targeted in offline mode, Estonia emerged stronger by investing heavily in cyber defense mechanisms. Another effort in this case stood was with the hosting of NATO’s Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence to build one of the world’s most resilient e-governance models. 

Singapore is another case. Where, recognising its vulnerability as a global financial hub, it has adopted a defense-centric deterrence strategy by focusing on redundancy, cyber education, and international partnership rather than offensive capacity. These approaches can also showcase that deterrence is not always about scaring attackers with retaliation, it is about making the attacks meaningless.  

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Cyber deterrence and Asymmetric Warfare

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Cyber conflict is understood through the lens of asymmetric warfare, where weaker actors exploit the unconventional and stronger foes. As guerrillas get outmanoeuvred by superpowers in Vietnam or Afghanistan, small states hold the capability to frustrate the cyber giants by turning their size into a shield. The essence of asymmetric cyber defence also lies in three principles, which can be mentioned as; 

• Resilience over retaliation by ensuring a rapid recovery to neutralise the goals of the attackers. 
• Undertaking smart investments focusing on limited budgets over critical assets, not sprawling infrastructures. 
• Leveraging norms to shape the international opinions to stigmatize the aggressors and increase the reputational costs. 

This also helps to transform the levels of cyber deterrence into a game of endurance rather than escalating it into a domain where small states can excel. 

There remain challenges as well, as attribution problems persist, the smaller nations still depend on foreign technology, which the adversaries have sought to exploit. Issues over the shortage of talent have plagued the small states, as cyber professionals have migrated to get lucrative jobs abroad. Moreover, building deterrence capability through norms requires active multilateral cooperation, which may not be possible for all small nations to sustain. 

Conclusion

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Cyberwarfare represents a new frontier of asymmetric conflict where size does not guarantee safety or supremacy. Great powers have often dominated the offensive cyber arsenals, where small states have carved their own path towards security by focusing on defence, resilience, and international collaboration. The examples of Singapore and Estonia demonstrate the fact that the small size of a state can be its identity of a hidden strength in capabilities like cyberspace, allowing nimbleness, concentration of resources and societal cohesion. In the long run, cyber deterrence for small states will not rest on fearsome retaliation but on making attacks futile and recovery inevitable. 

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References

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• https://bluegoatcyber.com/blog/asymmetric-warfare/
• https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2268&context=jss
• https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/rising-tide-cyberwarfare-battle-between-superpowers-hussain/ 
• https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1243&context=gpis_etds
• https://www.scirp.org/journal/paperinformation?paperid=141708
• https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1243&context=gpis_etds