By using this site, you agree to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.
Accept
SmartData Collective
  • Analytics
    AnalyticsShow More
    data analytics in sports industry
    Here’s How Data Analytics In Sports Is Changing The Game
    6 Min Read
    data analytics on nursing career
    Advances in Data Analytics Are Rapidly Transforming Nursing
    8 Min Read
    data analytics reveals the benefits of MBA
    Data Analytics Technology Proves Benefits of an MBA
    9 Min Read
    data-driven image seo
    Data Analytics Helps Marketers Substantially Boost Image SEO
    8 Min Read
    construction analytics
    5 Benefits of Analytics to Manage Commercial Construction
    5 Min Read
  • Big Data
  • BI
  • Exclusive
  • IT
  • Marketing
  • Software
Search
© 2008-23 SmartData Collective. All Rights Reserved.
Reading: Too Connected, Or Not Connected Enough?
Share
Notification Show More
Latest News
big data mac performance
Data-Driven Tips to Optimize the Speed of Macs
News
3 Ways AI Has Helped Marketers and Creative Professionals Streamline Workflows
3 Ways AI Has Helped Marketers and Creative Professionals Streamline Workflows
Artificial Intelligence
data analytics in sports industry
Here’s How Data Analytics In Sports Is Changing The Game
Big Data
data analytics on nursing career
Advances in Data Analytics Are Rapidly Transforming Nursing
Analytics
data analytics reveals the benefits of MBA
Data Analytics Technology Proves Benefits of an MBA
Analytics
Aa
SmartData Collective
Aa
Search
  • About
  • Help
  • Privacy
Follow US
© 2008-23 SmartData Collective. All Rights Reserved.
SmartData Collective > Uncategorized > Too Connected, Or Not Connected Enough?
Uncategorized

Too Connected, Or Not Connected Enough?

Daniel Tunkelang
Last updated: 2009/04/21 at 2:28 PM
Daniel Tunkelang
4 Min Read
SHARE

A bit off my usual selection of topics, but an article by Bruce Perens about a cyber-attack on Morgan Hill, a small city in northern California caught my attention:

Just after midnight on Thursday, April 9, unidentified attackers climbed down four manholes serving the Northern California city of Morgan Hill and  cut eight fiber cables  in what appears to have been an organized attack on the electronic infrastructure of an American city. Its implications, though startling, have gone almost un-reported.

That attack demonstrated a severe fault in American infrastructure: its centralization. The city of Morgan Hill and parts of three counties lost 911 service, cellular mobile telephone communications, land-line telephone, DSL internet and private networks, central station fire and burglar alarms, ATMs, credit card terminals, and monitoring of critical utilities. In addition, resources that should not have failed, like the local hospital’s internal computer network, proved to be dependent on external resources, leaving the hospital with a “paper system” for the day.

Read the full article for details. What struck me was the following question: is the vulnerability a si…

More Read

big data improves

3 Ways Big Data Improves Leadership Within Companies

IT Is Not Analytics. Here’s Why.
Romney Invokes Analytics in Rebuke of Trump
WEF Davos 2016: Top 100 CEO bloggers
In Memoriam: Robin Fray Carey

A bit off my usual selection of topics, but an article by Bruce Perens about a cyber-attack on Morgan Hill, a small city in northern California caught my attention:

Just after midnight on Thursday, April 9, unidentified attackers climbed down four manholes serving the Northern California city of Morgan Hill and  cut eight fiber cables  in what appears to have been an organized attack on the electronic infrastructure of an American city. Its implications, though startling, have gone almost un-reported.

That attack demonstrated a severe fault in American infrastructure: its centralization. The city of Morgan Hill and parts of three counties lost 911 service, cellular mobile telephone communications, land-line telephone, DSL internet and private networks, central station fire and burglar alarms, ATMs, credit card terminals, and monitoring of critical utilities. In addition, resources that should not have failed, like the local hospital’s internal computer network, proved to be dependent on external resources, leaving the hospital with a “paper system” for the day.

Read the full article for details. What struck me was the following question: is the vulnerability a sign of our being too connected, or not connected enough?

Perens notes how the attack demonstrated unnecessary dependence on connectivity, e.g., in the hospital’s internal network. But in an era of cloud computing, such dependencies on external services are becoming more common. It’s certainly easy to read a lesson in this experience that our systems should perform better in disconnected mode.

But the other lesson may be that it was too easy to disconnect the city. Should cutting eight cables be enough to disconnect over 50,000 people (not just in Morgan Hill, but also in nearby counties)? Should we instead be trying to achieve the fault tolerance of a mesh network? I’m no networking expert, so I don’t know whether, aside from the fixed costs associated with overhauling network infrastructure, mesh networking is efficient enough to replace our current architecture.

In any case, it was a sobering article. I’d like to believe it would be much harder to perpretrate a similar attack on my somewhat larger home town. But, more importantly, I’d like to think we are building a more reliable network of dependencies that exploits the extensive research on the subject.

Link to original post

Daniel Tunkelang April 21, 2009
Share this Article
Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIn
Share

Follow us on Facebook

Latest News

big data mac performance
Data-Driven Tips to Optimize the Speed of Macs
News
3 Ways AI Has Helped Marketers and Creative Professionals Streamline Workflows
3 Ways AI Has Helped Marketers and Creative Professionals Streamline Workflows
Artificial Intelligence
data analytics in sports industry
Here’s How Data Analytics In Sports Is Changing The Game
Big Data
data analytics on nursing career
Advances in Data Analytics Are Rapidly Transforming Nursing
Analytics

Stay Connected

1.2k Followers Like
33.7k Followers Follow
222 Followers Pin

You Might also Like

big data improves
Big DataJobsKnowledge ManagementUncategorized

3 Ways Big Data Improves Leadership Within Companies

6 Min Read
Image
Uncategorized

IT Is Not Analytics. Here’s Why.

7 Min Read

Romney Invokes Analytics in Rebuke of Trump

4 Min Read

WEF Davos 2016: Top 100 CEO bloggers

14 Min Read

SmartData Collective is one of the largest & trusted community covering technical content about Big Data, BI, Cloud, Analytics, Artificial Intelligence, IoT & more.

giveaway chatbots
How To Get An Award Winning Giveaway Bot
Big Data Chatbots Exclusive
ai is improving the safety of cars
From Bolts to Bots: How AI Is Fortifying the Automotive Industry
Artificial Intelligence

Quick Link

  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy
Follow US

© 2008-23 SmartData Collective. All Rights Reserved.

Removed from reading list

Undo
Go to mobile version
Welcome Back!

Sign in to your account

Lost your password?