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Information psychological war

Date: May 11, 2004
Source: Computer Crime Research Center
By: Andrey Manoilo

In clause the new technique of criminological researches of modern information-psychological war as complex sociopolitical phenomenon in a life of a society is offered. Today information-psychological war as the factor of foreign policy is investigated level with the diplomatic, economic and armed struggle, developing at the same time as an independent direction of scientific research. However, in our opinion, any of scientific approaches existing today does not open essence of information-psychological war neither as political conflict nor as social phenomenon, that, probably, and is a principal cause of an inefficiency of means chosen today and methods of political regulation of the given category of public attitudes. All this demands development of new methodology of research of information-psychological war which would allow, depending on a concrete political situation, to consider this phenomenon at various levels of scientific knowledge: in global scales as the social phenomenon and criminological environment, at a geostrategic level as a field of information - political conflicts, at a tactical level - as the special form of a political conflict and at an applied level as the tool of an information policy.

Prompt development of global communication systems and telecommunications, network and information technologies, transferring of a significant part of social activity of all society and its separate members from space of an objective reality in new t. n. The virtual or information-psychological space (such environment of ability to live of the person which has no analogues in the nature surrounding us and, as against the nature, it is created by the person, his technical progress and revolution in mental development), creates essentially new opportunities for dialogue, information interchange and interactions between members of a society and, by virtue of it, inevitably attracts occurrence of a plenty of new means, methods, ways and opportunities of rendering information-psychological the influences, obliged to the occurrence is extreme to those processes which can be named transition of a society from a "industrial" stage of development to "information". These new opportunities are widely used by criminality for fulfilment of illegal acts, not only expanding their list, but also lifting technics of fulfilment of crimes on qualitatively other, higher, a level.
In our opinion, one of such new versions of the criminal actions connected to global information and with the growing role of the information in a life of a society, so-called information-psychological war, which components is information-psychological operations. Today are everywhere used in external and internal political strike, in an economic competition, in local confrontations.
In a general plan any operation of information-psychological war can be presented as set of four basic components:
1. A management of operation - activity on the organization, management and coordination of actions and actions of information-psychological war, maneuvering by forces and the means involved in operation.
2. Actions of penetration to another's information resources (information-technical influence) which can be straight lines (for example, use of potential of hackers for breaking the protected network resources) or nondirective (for example, use of nocuous programs) and to have the direct purpose plunder, destruction, updating of the information belonging to these resources, or fulfilment of a various sort of diversions (for example, time infringement of working capacity of a network infrastructure).
3. Actions of psychological influence on mass and individual consciousness of a society and his separate citizens (dezinformation, manipulation, propagation, lobbying, management of crises, and also various combinations of these elements in frameworks of more complex psychological operations).
4. Auxiliary activity (maintenance of safety requirements and conspiracies of information-psychological operations, material and personnel maintenance, etc.).
Basically, all actions of penetration to another's information resources are reduced to so-called computer crimes and basically are covered by working criminal legislation.
The actions of psychological influence used in operations of psychological war, practically are not covered by the current legislation, not registered in an obvious kind in the criminal code of the Russian Federation and, basically, in most cases are not penal acts that noticeably complicates the organization of effective counteraction to these acts. It is supposed, that a first step to development of corresponding additions in the working Russian legislation (for example, in the criminal code) becomes the legal qualification developed by authors (object, the subject, the objective, subjective party) such illegal acts, allowing to attribute them to crimes.
At the criminal-legal characteristic of the basic structural elements of operations of information-psychological war it is necessary to mean, that approach of criminal and other responsibility for the acts attributed to structural elements of operations of information-psychological war, not always it is possible, as in the international and national legislations regulation of attitudes in sphere of information-psychological wars practically is absent. Besides not always designated as structural elements of operations of information-psychological war of the phenomenon can be attributed to criminal actions, or rather difficultly to prove the subjective party of the given act.
Severe classification of such elements of information-psychological influence is extremely complicated, t. To. Those fragments of information-psychological operations and actions which can be observed, analyzing diplomatic actions, various propaganda, PR, the public selective companies, amaze imagination with a specific variety of receptions used in them and technologies. Simple transfer of such elements with a binding to concrete conditions and situations (operative conditions) in which they have been realized, will borrow not one ten sheets. By virtue of the bulkiness such list is useless enough as for practical application by a method of copying of these receptions in similar conditions of operative conditions (as it is practically impossible to pick up a suitable pattern for a real multifactorial situation), and for forecasting the further succession of events in a real situation which without ceremony can be result of application of one more way of the information-psychological influence which were not including in the given list.
However, one of the ways of development of classification of elements of information-psychological influence determining the maintenance of information-psychological war, can be allocation from their variety of final (small) number axiomatically simple, most frequently met, "typical" elements, such, that any complex, atypical action of information-psychological war could be presented as a combination of these elements, - that is on them to spread out. Reception as it is uneasy to notice, is taken from mathematics with its axiomatic structure.
As such basic elements it is possible to suggest to take six base making information-psychological influences:
1. Dezinformation.
2. Lobbying.
3. A manipulation.
4. Propagation.
5. Management of crises.
6. Blackmail.
All this demands more steadfast research of information-psychological war as complex and multifactorial phenomenon in a life of a modern society. And the major direction of such research should become her criminological analysis.
From our point of view, information-psychological war (IPW) in frameworks of criminological researches can be considered at various levels of knowledge:
- As the social phenomenon;
- As a field of political conflicts;
- As the special form of a political conflict;
- As an element of system of tools of political regulation (the tool of an information policy).
Within the framework of each of the specified levels of consideration information-psychological war is investigated within the framework of own scientific hypothesis:
1. The sociological hypothesis of information-psychological war: information-psychological war is the social phenomenon and the new form of public attitudes generated by an information society.
2. The statistical hypothesis of information-psychological war: information-psychological war is the field of the political conflicts which are taking place in close interrelation and interaction;
3. The conflictological hypothesis of information-psychological war: information-psychological war is political conflict with the purpose of resolution of conflicts concerning authority and management in which collision of the parties is carried out in the form of information-psychological operations with application of the information weapon [1].
The purpose of information-psychological war: resolution of conflicts concerning authority and realization of a political management in information-psychological space.
Tasks of information-psychological war:
- Transformation of structure of national economic, political, welfare, information-psychological spaces of participants of the international attitudes according to own principles of formation of an information-political picture of the world;
- Achievement of the military-political superiority and unconditional leadership in sphere of the international attitudes;
- Achievement of the purposes of national economic, ideological, cultural, information-psychological expansion;
- Maintenance of favorable conditions for transition of own national system of sociopolitical attitudes to...


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2004-11-04 12:39:15 - I want to have full details on... Adetayo Adesola T.
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2004-08-23 03:45:33 - This translation is very poor. I don't... Flanders
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