Russia’s Cyber Strategies

Fourth-generation warfare is defined as the use of nonstate actors to further the state agenda.  This is typically done using “cultures, tribes, sects, and mercenaries” [2].  Fifth-generation warfare consists of using perception and information as weapons to manipulate the masses world view to discredit or cause distrust of a group, state, or country.  Since the earlier 2000s Russia has weaved fourth and fifth-generation warfare tactics into its military strategies.

Russia has used these strategies in the cyber domain to disrupt and control the information.  Russia typically uses propaganda, hacktivists, trolls, and bots to manipulate the cyber domain.  They have used hacktivists groups such as “CyberCaliphate” and “CyberBerkut” to attack French TV stations and conduct “distributed denial of service attacks against NATO, Ukraine, and German government websites” [1].  They also use troll armies to manipulate the narrative of online message boards to favor that of Russian interests.  Bots are often used to push specific content on social media at a rate which can overwhelm the reader and a discourage them from looking for real information. 

Russia does not only focus its efforts on the attack side of the cyber domain but, has taken great steps to improving its cyber defense capabilities as well.  “The Russian Federation Security Council’s 2016 Information Security Doctrine” goes as far and as stating the need to create a national system that allows for government control of the internet and information warfare weapons and forces.