Description: Yahoo was under attack, the first of several in one week that would dramatically expose cyberspace’s dirty secret: though the Internet is an amazing creation that has boosted our economy and provided lots of cheeky Super Bowl ads, it is still a work in progress that can be knocked silly with surprising ease. Even the e-commerce giants are no sturdier than any others. All it takes is a well-directed “denial of service” attack to blow away the edifices, at least on a temporary basis. And when you try to track the culprit, it turns out that all you can find is a shield–the dummy computers through which the cyber vandal laundered his poisonous computer code.

Source: Steve Levy, NewsWeek

Date: 1/21/2000

Link: http://www.newsweek.com/2000/02/20/hunting-the-hackers.html

Discussion Questions:

1. What defenses, if any, are there against cyber vandalism?