Russian-Georgian cyberwar: surge in Internet filtering and denial of service attacks

The conflict over Ossetia dramatically demonstrates the extent to which virtual space is now a domain of warfare. The OpenNet Initiative together with its sister project the Information Warfare Monitor are monitoring the fallout from the virtual battlefield. The latest results of our research are posted to www.infowar-monitor.net . Our research indicates a massive upsurge in denial of service attacks against Georgian government and media sites occured in the hours that followed the start of the conflict. Major Russian media sites, including Izvestia and RAI Novosti, were also attacked as were two Azeri sites, Days.az and ANS.az. The leading Georgian ISP, Caucasus On-line, is currently filtering access to Russian media sites in the .ru domain.