How hackers could trigger nuclear war

NUCLEAR weapons relying on new technology are increasingly vulnerable to cyber-attacks that could have catastrophic consequences, a report warns today.

Enemies operating online could sabotage control systems to make nuclear-armed states such as Britain launch a strike against another country by mistake, the Chatham House think-tank said.

It also raised the prospect of ‘cyber-spoofing’ to create false information that seems to come from a legitimate source but affects a country’s decision-making process.

This could ‘ hijack decision-making with potentially devastating consequences’.

There is an increasing likelihood of attempted cyber- attacks on nuclear weapons through ‘advanced persistent threats from states and non-state groups’, it said.

The Chatham House report, published today, warns that a national nuclear arsenal, such as the weapons carried by Britain’s Trident submarines, could be hacked and sabotaged through the use of computer viruses.

It said: ‘At times of heightened tension, cyber-attacks on nuclear weapons systems could cause an escalation which results in their use. Inadvertent nuclear launches could stem from an unwitting reliance on false information and data.

‘With the potential for such catastrophic consequences from a nuclear weapons detonation attack it is crucial to have the most robust nuclear policies in place.’

The paper’s authors, Dr Beyza Unal and Dr Patricia Lewis, said that with each new digital component embedded in a nuclear weapons system, new risks emerge.

They added the vulnerability of systems to hacking would at best undermine trust but ‘at worst cyberattacks could lead to deliberate misinformation and the inadvertent launch of nuclear weapons’.