1/11

With no established rules or standards of behaviour,the cyber world is one of today’s frontiers much like space was in the 1950s. Pictured:the mesophere,just above the maximum altitude for aircraft but below the level of orbiting satellites.Credit:NASA

2/11

With no rules or geography,physical boundaries mostly meaningless,real-world institutions,governments,and businesses often don’t know who is hacking them,why,and what their intention is. Firemen struggle to extinguish the fire at the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline near the eastern Turkish city of Erzincan on August 7,2008,which was later ruled as being caused by a cyber attack.Credit:Reuters

3/11

The state of confusion complicates any plans for a response. Is an attack an act of mischief? A protest? An act of war? The answer may require a response from business,military or government,or a combination of the three. Defense Secretary Ash Carter meets Admiral Mike Rogers,head of the National Security Agency (NSA),at NSA headquarters at Fort Meade,Maryland.

4/11

China’s hackers,for example,have a reputation for tapping sensitive data from universities,government departments and businesses. Much hacking is of economic secrets. However,China’s hackers have also been blamed for the theft of Western weapons technology such as plans for the F-35 joint strike fighter.Credit:Reuters

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5/11

Struggling to get a grasp on the problem has spurred a boom in better visualisation tools. The more malicious acts can be visualised,the easier,it's hoped,that they can be addressed. Pictured:Norse IPViking Online Map showing attacks and traffic in real time.Credit:Norse Corp

6/11

But clear-cut cases are elusive. The 2014 hack of Sony Pictures was the equivalent of a burglary of sensitive company emails,plans,even screenplays that were then strewn in public,to cause damage and embarrassment. The White House blamed North Korean-linked hackers. Pictured:Workers remove a poster-banner for The Interview from a billboard in Hollywood,a day after Sony announced it had no choice but to cancel the movie's release - a decision it later reversed under public pressure.Credit:Getty Images

7/11

The Natanz nuclear facility in Iran in 2002. Stuxnet,an extremely sophisticated industrial process virus,attributed to the US and Israel,destroyed about 20 per cent of Iran'€™s nuclear centrifuges from 2009-2010. The centrifuges,which weren't accessible via the internet,are used for the enrichment of uranium.Credit:AP Photo/DigitalGlobe

8/11

Criminal and activist hacker groups and non-state actors that co-operate with foreign governments make attribution more difficult. Video posted on YouTube of an Anonymous Australia member in a Guy Fawkes mask,in a warning to Indonesian hackers during tensions between the two countries earlier this year.Credit:Justin McManus

9/11

Global perceptions matter too. Ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden's disclosures have put the US on the defensive over cyber operations. A participant holds up a picture of Snowden with the German word for"asylum"during a 2013 protest in Berlin.Credit:Getty

10/11

In the absence of ground rules,governments are stepping up their capability and integrating them with military and intelligence operations. Russia,for example,sees cyber as an element of a broader information warfare strategy. Lyudmila Savchuk,of St Petersburg,was once a"Kremlin troll"working as part of an online propaganda network trying to shape public opinion in Russia,the US and Europe.Credit:AP/ Dmitry Lovetsky

11/11

But as stakes rise,the chance of miscalculation grows. At the same time,the lack of consequences associated with cyberattacks has more voices calling for Western governments to respond,even beyond the internet. A chart of data breaches is shown on Capitol Hill in Washington in June 2015.Credit:AP/Cliff Owen