Article

Cyber war inc. : the law of war implications of the private sector's role in cyber conflict

Hannah Lobel

• Texas international law journal, Vol. 47, no. 3, Spring 2012, p. 617-640

English

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Part I, briefly characterizes how scholars have mapped the law of war onto cyber conflict generally, considering both jus ad bellum and jus in bello regimes. This analysis is key to understanding how the ambiguities plaguing the application of the law of war to cyber conflict are further complicated when the private sector plays a role. Part II, considers the Obama administration’s proposal to foster public-private partnerships as a means of combating cyber attacks, as well as a few current models proposed by legal scholars to address this dilemma. The article points out law of war blind spots in these political and scholarly proposals and argue that how these issues are resolved will have important implications for the development of customary international law in cyber conflicts. The primary concerns in this regard are the erosion of the state’s monopoly on the use of force and the eroding standard for imputation of non-state actor conduct to states. The last section offers a brief conclusion.

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