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INTERNATIONAL LEGAL RESPONSES TO CYBERATTACKS: DISTINCTIONS BETWEEN PEACETIME NORMS AND THE LAW OF ARMED CONFLICT AN ANALYSIS BASED ON CYBERATTACKS AGAINST ESTONIA (2007) AND UKRAINE (2022–2024)
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This Master's thesis investigates the responses provided by international law to cyberattacks both in peacetime and in times of armed conflict. In particular, the thesis takes the 2007 cyberattacks against Estonia and the cyberattacks against Ukraine accompanying Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022-2024 as case studies. These examples are used to analyze how international humanitarian law and international human rights law respond to cyberattacks, and what the limitations of the legal frameworks are. In addition, the analysis includes
customary international law, UN norms of responsible state behaviour in cyberspace, the UN Charter, and the application of the Tallinn Manual 2.0 to cyberattacks.
The analysis concluded that some notable shortcomings of international human rights law, the UN Charter and the Tallinn Manual, which are applicable in peacetime, as illustrated by the Estonian example, are threshold problems under the UN Charter, as well as the lack of binding enforcement mechanisms. This allows states to evade legal responsibility and civilians, whose human rights are violated through attacks, remain unprotected. The example of Ukraine illustrates how international humanitarian law is applied in parallel with human
rights law during armed conflict. In such a situation some of the existing gaps are the distinction between civilian and military infrastructure and whether the cyber operations qualify as an "attack". However, the main gap in both contexts is attribution, largely due to the anonymity of cyberspace. This is further exacerbated by political obstacles within collective security institutions.
A step forward to addressing these problem is offered by the non-binding UN initiative, the UN norms for the responsible conduct of states in cyberspace. These provide guidance on the challenges arising from cyber operations, but due to their voluntary nature, they do not result in sanctions or set out enforcement mechanisms that can be applied in peacetime and in times of armed conflict. Therefore, this thesis concludes that international law needs major changes not only to address current threats arising from cyberspace but also to stay ahead of them. The thesis offers several proposals, including the hardening of the non-binding initiative in order to become binding and supplement it with the missing specifications. An alternative option would be to create a new treaty that is binding from the outset and imposes obligations and protections on states.
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Cyberattacks International Humanitarian Law International Human Rights Law UN Charter Tallinn Manual Attribution Estonia Ukraine