US Officials 'Strategically Leak' That US Is Ready To Hack Russia If It Interferes With ElectionI'd imagine that our electrical grid and our communications grid are much more fragile and vulnerable than what exists in Russia. If we start this game, we can't complain when it comes back to bite us in the ass! And then there's this angle:
Dangerous game: So now if, say, a Russian missile were to take out a civilian target they can blame it on the US government. The US did, after all, admit that they had hacked the Russian systems.
If we mess with their systems, then it's easy to claim that it was our tampering that caused a malfunction. Only our leaders here in the USA are stupid enough to start a cyberwar based on false claims that Russia hacked targets here first.
Going all the way back to the early summer, when Russia's role in any hacks was totally speculative, some were already advocating for "cyberwar" as a response. As we reached the fall, suddenly it was leaked that many inside the government were getting itchy trigger fingers to launch some sort of digital attack. And, government officials really seemed to rely on the ever gullible reporters at NBC to push this story.
LINK:
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20161106/00352135973/us-officials-strategically-leak-that-us-is-ready-to-hack-russia-if-it-interferes-with-election.shtml