Recently, a Chinese surveillance balloon flew over Canada and the United States before it crashed off the southeastern coast of the United States. This has caused a lot of speculation and confusion. While some may think this is just a political game, I believe it is an example of a nation-state using all the resources it has to gain information about a potential adversary. The balloon posed a physical threat if it had fallen in a populated area, so it was shot down by a US F-22 Raptor and fell into US waters. There is also a technological threat posed by the balloon, as it could have been collecting intelligence. This includes GEOINT, ELINT, MASINT, and SIGINT. GEOINT is the ability to document the land below from 60,000 feet in high definition. ELINT is the interception of telemetry, command and control signals, and tests. MASINT is the sampling of gases, vapors, dust, and fibers in the air. SIGINT is the sampling of the radio spectrum, cataloging publicly available networks and signals from those of closed corporate networks. The balloon passed over Idaho, which could have been surveying for areas to acquire as part of the Chinese farm acquisition program. The US government may or may not share what was found, but it is likely that the Chinese will try to use this as an intelligence-gathering exercise.
This Cyber News was published on www.csoonline.com. Publication date: Thu, 09 Feb 2023 10:09:02 +0000