By Major Van Harl USAF Ret
Wisconsin –-(Ammoland.com)- When the subject comes up in conversation about me writing a newspaper column I am usually asked who I write for. I tell folks my parent paper is the Altus Times of Altus, Oklahoma (www.altustimes.com). I have been writing a weekly veterans / military related column for the Altus Times for over ten years.
I also write for the monthly paper The Veterans Voice (www.theveteransvoice.com). For the last couple of years I have been writing for the on-line outdoor related news website, AmmoLand Shooting Sports News (www.ammoland.com).
I am a little behind the times in the world of instant communications. I do not have my own website. I don’t do Facebook. I cannot text or tweet and I do not have a smart phone. All I have is a desk top computer, so every day I check my e-mails and log onto Ammoland.com to see what is happening with that web site.
To my surprise on Wednesday (25 Feb 2015) AmmoLand.com was “dark”. It just would not come up on my computer. I picked up the phone and called my editor and asked what was going on. It would appear the Persians had cyber attacked AmmoLand.com on-line and shut them down.
It took the IT support people over eight hours to get AmmoLand.com back on-line. The source of the attack on AmmoLand.com was traced to a technical college in Iran. The Persians had attacked one part of the American gun industry—the on-line written part of our 1st and 2nd amendment.
The Persians temporarily stopped the ability to project free speech and ability to speak freely about firearms and all that that implies, in a pro-gun world.
So what! Ammoland.com is basically just an on-line gun magazine. Was anybody really hurt because they could not read an article on yet another newly released bolt action rife or another cloned 1911 45acp handgun?
AmmoLand.com is an American business and it is in business to do two things: make money so the business can continue and to project the positive news side of the constitutionally protected right to keep and bear arms.
The AmmoLand.com site was down for over 8 hours. On average 30,000 people make contact with AmmoLand.com and its related newsfeeds every day. There are a whole lot of liberal on-line blogs and fashion industry websites that would kill to have AmmoLand.com’s following. When you go on the website notice how many prominent manufacturers in the big “firearms” world have long running advertisement on AmmoLand.com. If something is breaking news related to the Second Amendment there is a very good chance it will break first on AmmoLand.com.
The point is the Persians and their fellow hackers throughout the world (read the Chinese) are practicing real hard to be able someday to massively attack our in-country US websites. Perhaps doing this as a precursor to some type of physical attack? What if they get good enough at this, to hack into our utilities and cut off electricity and water supplies? Or they could hack into the trucking industry and screw up the just-in-time delivery system that North America has become too overly dependent on.
If the food delivery trucks miss two days of re-supply to the supermarkets of the nation there will be nothing to eat. Maybe they will start out slow and go after the on-line retail providers.
Lord help the nation if the thirty-year-old and under group have their cell phones cut off for an entire day because the Persians hacked into the phone companies and crashed text and tweet. Who knows what would happen if a pre-teen could not post a selfie because their Chinese-made smart phone was down, due to Chinese hackers interrupting their daily cell phone rituals?
I am currently sitting on an emergency preparedness / management committee for a city. All the inter-city disciplines have representatives on the committee. Many of the disciplines such as fire, police, EMT, and civil engineers have their own communications systems, but it is very striking how they all have cell phones and do most of their day-to-day and even emergency communications by those cell phones.
We have become too dependent on the freedom & capabilities of cell phones and the Persians know this.
So I called my old Infantry school roommate, who sits an intel-desk somewhere in the bowels of the US Army (read spy) and he told me not to count out the Chinese, the Russians, the North Koreans and organized crime. They all have the ability to hack and attack the good people’s on-line systems and make it look like it came from the Persians.
Jeesh, I feel so much better after researching this topic. Buy fresh ammo you cannot hack it but you can stack it.
25 Feb 2015 / Major Van Harl USAF Ret. / [email protected]
About Major Van Harl USAF Ret.:Major Van E. Harl USAF Ret., a career Police Officer in the U.S. Air Force was born in Burlington, Iowa, USA, in 1955. He was the Deputy Chief of police at two Air Force Bases and the Commander of Law Enforcement Operations at another. He is a graduate of the U.S. Army Infantry School. A retired Colorado Ranger and currently is an Auxiliary Police Officer with the Cudahy PD in Milwaukee County, WI. His efforts now are directed at church campus safely and security training. He believes “evil hates organization.” [email protected]
Iran is a country. Those who live in iran are referred to legally as Iranians. Those who live outside of iran and are in opposition to the current government in iran but are of iranian heritage prefer to be called Persians, so they are in no way associated with the current islamic state. If the hack attack came from Iran the best way to describe it would be to characterize it as an iranian attack. Persia is an historical and cultural term, and fails to qualify the who and where in this case.
Sam Jones –
While Iran is a Muslim theocracy today, the culture of the natives of Iran can still be referred to as “Persian” – and these days, the Iranians appear to be attempting to re-institute their “Empire.” The Persians were primarily Shia Muslims so they really haven’t changed too much over the centuries.
A very chilling look at what MIGHT be reality…..
Major, Have you gone over to the “dark side” of PC? The Persian Empire ceased to exist some time ago. Today’s Iran is a Muslim Theocracy, under absolute control of the head mullah.
We all remember the great “Persian Rugs”, but the populace of that nation today are Muslim, and all Muslim.
Maybe he confused them with ‘Parisian Islamic Terrorists’.
I thought I was being ‘censored’. LOL
Hey don’t we have one of those people sitting in the white house?