US ELECTION BLACKOUT
It could be a way to silence Trump, Clinton, or both during the elections. Perhaps Hillary is shutting down some of Donald's favorite mediums. Or perhaps Old Friend Russia is meddling in our affairs again. It will be interesting to see how much they meddle in our future affairs. Either way, there could be even more controversy surrounding this already muddled election.
MISDIRECTION
A covert ops is taking place somewhere on the globe, possibly even in the US, and this is an attack that not only hinders news outlets, but creates a large news story in itself, helping black out whatever they don't want us to know. We may find out about their secret actions today in the months and years to come, but by the time we know what happened, it will be out of everyone's minds.
SHENANIGANS
Of all the theories, this is the one we hope is true. It's just some script kiddies who got a hold of a large number of computers and are taking down websites as a prank. Much like the "2011 PLAYSTATION NETWORK OUTAGE" (and the subsequent outages that still plague the network), they may attempting to disrupt people's Internet lives. The fact that many media-consumption sites like Spotify, Netflix, Twitter, Reddit, and others, could signify that.
TESTING FOR FUTURE ATTACKS
The method for the attack is well known and could be a test to see what is needed for future tactical operations. We've already seen tests being performed in large hacks. Hackers have been pulling off coordinated attacks at strategic points of the Internet's infrastructure, not only testing for vulnerabilities, but also testing their tools and systems for compromising various systems. Maybe this is a test of what they can do, and we should brace for a more powerful attack in the near future. Read more in Schneier on Security's article: "Someone is Learning How to Take Down the Internet."
REDACTION
With so much of the Internet down, who knows what these hackers may be doing in the meantime. Perhaps they're using this as cover while they do nefarious things to the infected servers: altering documents, deleting information, uploading misinformation, etc. Maybe when the Internet does come back up, not everything will be coming with it...
OTHER THOUGHTS
- Recently, Julian Assange had his Internet cut off by the Ecuadorian government at the behest of the United States. Could the timing mean anything?
- What steps will be taken to work on securing the Internet of Things? Its vulnerability played a major part in today's outage.
EDITOR'S NOTE: Who have chosen to capitalize Internet to show it the respect it deserves.
