This paper draws on deterrence theory to analyze the challenges that the United States faces in deterring cyber attacks. We begin by briefly reviewing the basic logic of deterrence theory and relating it to the challenge posed by cyber attacks. The following section explores what is commonly viewed as the key problem in deterring cyber attacks—the “attribution problem” arises when a state canno...

Differentiating empirically between deterrence and incapacitation is difficult since both are a function of expected punishment. In this article we demonstrate that the introduction of sentence enhancements provides a direct means of measuring deterrence. Because the criminal would have been sentenced to prison even without the law change, there is no additional incapacitation effect from the s...

Nuclear deterrence is sometimes treated as a known quantity*a definite thing that keeps us safe and ensures our security. It has also often been used as a justification for possessing nuclear weapons. Nuclear deterrence, however, is based on an unexamined notion: the belief that the threat to destroy cities provides decisive leverage. An examination of history (including recent reinterpretation...

This study discusses some empirical findings on various computer and Internet-related crimes. An appropriate diffusion model was used that encompassed modeling of two opposite behaviors—imitation and deterrence acts. The model also is adequate for handling sparse data. The model was used to analyze various types of attack. The results shows that different types of attacks follow different types...

Deterrence-based initiatives form a cornerstone of many road safety countermeasures. This approach is informed by Classical Deterrence Theory, which proposes that individuals will be deterred from committing offences if they fear the perceived consequences of the act, especially the perceived certainty, severity and swiftness of sanctions. While deterrence-based countermeasures have proven effe...

Deterrence has been a crucial element in fighting terrorism, both in actual politics and rational choice analyses of terrorism. But there are superior strategies to deterrence. One is to make terrorist attacks less attractive. Another to raise the opportunity cost – rather than the material cost – to terrorists. These alternative strategies effectively dissuade potential terrorists. The strateg...

A new line of nuclear winter research shows that even small, regional nuclear wars could have catastrophic global consequences. However, major disarmament to avoid nuclear winter goes against the reasons nuclear weapon states have for keeping their weapons in the first place, in particular deterrence. To reconcile these conflicting aims, this paper develops the concept of winter-safe deterrence...

This paper provides a sketch of a contractarian approach to punishment, according to a version of contractarianism one might call “rational contractarianism,” by contrast with the normative contractarianism of John Rawls. Rational contractarianism suggests a model according to which rational agents, with maximal, rather than minimal, knowledge of their life circumstances, would agree to the out...