100 Places You Will Never Visit

LOCATION Beijing, China

NEAREST POPULATION HUB Beijing

SECRECY OVERVIEW Operations classified: China’s front line in the age of cyber warfare.

Ever since the rise of the internet, futurologists have predicted that where wars were once fought on battlefields and won with gunfire, they will one day be fought in the cyberworld against a backdrop of mouse clicks. In 2010, China seemed to signal the approach of this new age when it announced the establishment of a government-run cyber defense base.

There are those who argue convincingly that we are already living in a world of cyber wars, where lapses in electronic security are exploited for commercial, political or even military advantage. For instance, it has been widely speculated that the Stuxnet virus that infiltrated Iran’s nuclear facilities in 2010 originated in Israel. India has also claimed that some of its government networks have been hit from Chinese bases. But it has so far been impossible to prove whether such attacks stemmed from the concerted efforts of government agencies, or from groups or individuals with their own agendas. The maverick actions of hacker collectives such as Anonymous and Lulzsec has further clouded the issue.

However, in 2009 the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission concluded that “there has been a marked increase in cyber intrusions originating in China and targeting US government and defense-related systems.” In turn, China has accused the White House of waging its own cyber attacks, a claim vehemently denied in Washington.

In truth, many of the world’s most powerful nations are developing cyber warfare divisions within their armed services. Washington established its US Cyber Command unit in 2009 to counteract online criminal and espionage activity. But the announcement by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army a year later that it had set up an Information Security Base, under the jurisdiction of the powerful General Staff headquarters in Beijing, ramped up the sense of tension.

The announcement’s lack of even the most basic details about the base and its operations did little to steady nerves, though a Chinese spokesman insisted that “it is a ‘defensive’ base for information security, not an offensive headquarters for cyber war.” Just don’t expect to be able to take a tour around its headquarters to decide for yourself any time soon.