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Cyberpunk: 2013

I have always been a gaming geek.  Be it miniature games (Warhammer 40k), board games, role-playing games or video games.  I love games.  Part of the reason why I like them is you get to suspend your beliefs and be someone else.  One of my favorite genre of games was Cyberpunk.  A dystopian future where corporations rule the world and act as city states within the countries they reside.

I was reading an article on the Homeland Security News Wire (Report: US Companies Should Consider Counterhacking Chinese Hackers)  and it hit me that this is how it all began.  I am not an expert but isn't "counter-hacking" similar to what the Chinese is doing and what we called an act of war?  I am not an expert on Title 10 but this appears to blur the line here. Corporate entities launching cyberwar against nation states.  

The article does state that the report recommended that laws would have to be changed to support the recommendation but there are a number of issues.  We are assuming that corporations will be good citizens and use this power for good.  As we have seen with the RIAA, not all are good citizens.

While I doubt this will go very far, it does bring up a few interesting scenarios.  It is one thing to retaliate against an ordinary citizen that was stealing your IP but a nation state is different.  Suppose you attacked a country that was stealing your IP and were successful.  What would happen if they could determine that it was from a your company.  Would they escalate it on the world stage and threaten the country where you are based?  What would happen if you had a corporate presence in that country?  Would they retaliate against that location?  Arrest employees or take the building?  It's not like a corporate office is an embassy.

It's interesting times we live in.