US Air Force releases its cyber warfare manual online

Washington, Oct 25(ANI): A new United States Air Force (USAF) manual for cyber warfare has been made public, which dwells mostly on protecting military computer networks and makes little mention of attacking others.

The manual 'Cyberspace Operations: Air Force Doctrine Document 3-12' is dated July 15, but was not made public until this month.

According to the Daily Express, it is unclassified and available on the Internet.

It describes a fast-changing world where anonymous enemies can carry out devastating attacks in seconds.

"Relentless attackers are trying to hack into home and office networks in the U.S. millions of times a day, 24/7," the newspaper quoted the manual, as saying.

"Operating in cyberspace may require abandoning common assumptions concerning time and space because attacks can come from anywhere and take only seconds," it added.

Meanwhile, Noah Shachtman, a contributing editor to Wired magazine and a fellow at the Brookings Institute think-tank, said that the limited mention of offensive operations in the manual has surprised him.

The manual reveals that one of the cyber war objectives is "shutting down electrical power to key power grids of enemy leadership".

"That's usually not the kind of thing we talk about doing to others. The offensive stuff is super secret," Shachtman said. (ANI)