Presented at
DEF CON 31 (2023),
Aug. 12, 2023, 1 p.m.
(45 minutes).
The links between science fiction and reality have been demonstrated in numerous research studies. By speculating about the possible future uses of technologies under development, science fiction shows us plausible futures. In this sense, it allows us, as a society, to popularize and debate the consequences (expected or not) of our technological developments. In addition to this not negligible social role science fiction also has an impact on our current developments. We speak here of "loop-looping", i.e. there is a feedback loop between what science fiction shows us and what we are then led to actually develop. From this point of view, our imaginations are performative, and this is perhaps the most critical issue: what I see can happen. In the case of hacking and cybersecurity, a particular phenomenon is added: the general public's knowledge of these subjects is mainly through the fictions they watch, read, or listen to. We propose to analyze a corpus of 200 fictional attacks, and 800 real attacks and to compare them to define if the imaginary ones are predictive if they inform us or on the contrary mislead us as for the reality of the current attacks.
REFERENCES:
The subject of imaginaries is a key subject of the work of the Making Tomorrow collective co-founded by Nicolas Minvielle. As such, he has been able to conduct numerous studies aimed at analyzing the impact of science fiction on a given practice.
A book has been published on the subject and is available online in pdf format:
Minvielle, N. & Wathelet, O. & Lauquin, M. & Audinet, P., Design fiction for your organization, Making Tomorrow (2020), http://making-tomorrow.mkrs.fr/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Making-Tomorrow-Design-Fiction-and-more-for-your-organization.pdf
Academic references on this subject:
Brake, Mark, and Neil Hook, Different Engines: How Science Drives Fiction and Fiction Drives Science (London New York: Macmillan, 2008)
Carpenter, C. (2016). Rethinking the Political / -Science- / Fiction Nexus: Global Policy Making and the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots. Perspectives on Politics, 14(1), 53-69. doi:10.1017/S1537592715003229
Jones, C., & Paris, C. (2018). It’s the End of the World and They Know It: How Dystopian Fiction Shapes Political Attitudes. Perspectives on Politics, 16(4), 969-989. doi:10.1017/S1537592718002153
Kevin L Young, Charli Carpenter, Does Science Fiction Affect Political Fact? Yes and No: A Survey Experiment on “Killer Robots”, International Studies Quarterly, Volume 62, Issue 3, September 2018, Pages 562–576, https://doi.org/10.1093/isq/sqy028
Kirby, David A., Lab Coats in Hollywood: Science, Scientists, and Cinema (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 2011)
Maynard, Andrew D., Films from the Future: The Technology and Morality of Sci-Fi Movies (Coral Gables: Mango Publishing, 2018)
Seed, David, ed., Future Wars: The Anticipations and the Fears, Liverpool Science Fiction Texts and Studies, 42 (Liverpool: Liverpool Univ. Press, 2012)
Shedroff, Nathan, and Christopher Noessel, Make It so: Interaction Design Lessons from Science Fiction(Brooklyn, N.Y., USA: Rosenfeld Media, 2012)
Telotte, J. P., Replications: A Robotic History of the Science Fiction Film (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1995)
Westfahl, Gary, Wong Kin Yuen, and Amy Kit-sze Chan, eds., Science Fiction and the Prediction of the Future: Essays on Foresight and Fallacy, Critical Explorations in Science Fiction and Fantasy, 27 (Jefferson, N.C: McFarland, 2011)
Appadurai, Arjun, ed., The Future as Cultural Fact: Essays on the Global Condition (London: New York : Verso Books, 2013)
Here, a video (6’30 to 17’) of Xavier Facélina in 2017 inviting a panel to thing about cybersecurity from a different angle ; and with science fiction references (in French) :
https://youtu.be/PIVwcu-HhQo
Here, a video (8’55 to 29’55) of Nicolas Minvielle talking about the impact of science fiction in innovation (in French) : https://www.youtube.com/live/oK-k3AqdXBc?feature=share
Presenters:
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Nicolas Minvielle
- Making Tomorrow
former brand manager for Philippe Starck, professor, researcher and fututirst. Nicolas is also the head of the French Armie’s Science Fiction red Team
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Xavier Facélina
- Seclab
Xavier Facélina — former hacker, self taught entrepreneur, founded 3 cybersecurity companies including SECLAB, cybersecurity company protecting cyberphysical system (real world !) from cyberattacks.
Xavier has 25 years of experience in cybersecurity with a focus on digital war and cyberdefense. How he gets into this? By seeing the Wargames movie at the age of 8! Today, he still watch movies and read books and comics to anticipate what is coming.
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