Watching the Watchers: Sources for Studying Cyber Operations 

• In Event: Empirical Study of Cyberspace Conflict

Abstract

One of the most challenging aspects to studying cyber operations is the fact that many of them are intended to remain out of view. Even when the operations seek to have a demonstrable public effect, such as an obvious attack, the mechanics of how the operation was conducted often remains hidden. Yet these cyber capabilities are indisputably tools of statecraft; a failure to examine their use is a failure to examine one of the foremost ways in which states project power and shape the geopolitical environment. This paper examines the kinds of sources, from indictments to forensic reporting and beyond, that can inform high-quality and in-depth scholarship on cyber operations. It considers which sources are most useful for which kinds of studies and how high-quality insights can be spotted and referenced with confidence.

Author

• Ben Buchanan, Georgetown University