The point of a simulation isn't for technologists to practice business continuity and recovery plans, it was for executives to determine who they align with once their primary stakeholder relationships fail.<p>When you think of what such a coordinated attack would look like, and by who, the only plausible scenario to me is a Russia/China axis setting up a SWIFT alternative for client states and then attacking the US network as a way to ride to the rescue with the new one and use it as a forcing function to overcome switching costs. Otherwise, the economics of mere vandalism at that scale don't make sense. They'd broadcast their intentions anyway if that were the case. (e.g. de-dollarization, China's SDRs, etc.) I don't think they're ready yet.<p>There is a cynical view that this was related to a trial run to determine whether retail deposits could be shifted to a U.S. Fed and ECB or other temporary* liquidity facility, but the failure of the US admin to install its favored comptroller of currency nominee, who would be supportive of the scheme, has reduced its momentum. I don't know that this was part of the simulation, but shift from a monopolar world and the vacuum it has created means we're literally in an age of conspiracies, so it's one of those 'when the going gets weird, the weird turn pro' situations. When it clicks that "cyber" just means governance, these exercises become a useful signal for overarching power plays.<p>Imo, the real threats to the "global financial system," aren't really to it at all, as cyber is a tactic in support of other co-ordinated activities to destabilize individual governments by undermining civilian infrastructure. I would interpret these exercises as more of a war games demonstration for policymakers who may be thinking about supporting populist national policies in their countries and deviating from the emerging hegemon.
"One European financial official said that in the case of such of an attack, his country would not wait 10 days to act."<p>Since roughly January 2020, as a life scientist, my confidence in pretty much all of the world's governments' abilities to act quickly and/or in concert, in the face of an emergency, has gone from maybe ~60% to near 0%.
The US may be overplaying its hand, but it's certainly not as cut and dry as the comments would have you believe.<p>Russia and China are only allied around their common enemy, the US. Don't believe for a second that these two nations wouldn't throw each other under the bus if it furthered their respective causes.
Has anyone else thought about the risks of one or more national actors doing macro scale pump and dumps of cryptocurrencies combined with viral memes targeting populations of their adversaries tricking them into buying the top/selling the bottom?
People don't tend to accept rapid, life-altering changes, unless it's solving a crisis. We wouldn't have accepted lockdowns, face masks, and vaccine passports without a pandemic to justify them.<p>Masses of people would likely push back against CBDCs, unless they came in to fix and solve a crisis. A collapse of the electronic financial system would justify this.
internet pandemic =>
internet lockdowns =>
internet passports.<p>Is this Covid's digital counterpart in making way for Social Scoring Governance to be imported to the West?
The West is threatening to cut Russia from SWIFT financial transactions network. Russia is threatening back with a "strong response" that, for example, could come in a form of a cyber attack. It never hurts to be vigilant and test the financial system just in case.
I find it amazing how so many people don't know that the IMF is an NGO made up of a few wealthy people.<p>I suspect the "Financial System" being referred to is the SWIFT system and chances are in the next few years it will be replaced by a new Sino-Russian system backed by Saudi oil.<p>No cyber attacks will be needed to bring SWIFT down, just a few too many sanctions being wielded like cudgels by over eager bureaucrats trying to impose their "Morality" on the rest of the world.<p>I suppose it is possible that is the point, they want to be prepared for the backlash sure to follow when the Greenback is no longer the reserve currency.
Huh... maybe I'm getting confused but I could have sworn that my "vaccine-hesitant" friends were saying the IMF had been running (with others) simulations of a virus outbreak since 2010-ish, as part of the reason this was a "plandemic."<p>However, if a cyber attack does happen a few years from now that takes out the global financial system... it'll definitely make me a little queasy.