why aren't hack sabotages seen as acts of war?
they can do as much or more damage as, say, blowing up a bridge
they can do as much or more damage as, say, blowing up a bridge
There is this mistaken belief that an act of war somehow immediately and automatically triggers war. This is not the case. If a country wants to wage war against an other they will find a reason. If they don't want to / it is not in their interest to do so they won't.
This answers your question. It is not seen as an act of war because the country in question (Poland) wouldn't benefit from seeing it as an act of war at this moment in time.
As an example, if someone from Canada were to come to the US and blow up a government building, no matter how severe the damage and human loss, we wouldn't dare consider that an act of war by Canada, unless evidence existed that the Canadian government or military were involved somehow.
Likewise, Poland has no interest in defining malicious actions by a Russian national or Russian Imperialism supporter as an act of war by Russia without clear evidence that The Russian state was directly involved.
Getting back to the original point though, I see no reason not to define attacks against infrastructure, regardless of who was responsible, foreign or domestic, or their motives, as acts of terrorism.
Attacking infrastructure as a non-government entity can certainly be considered terrorism, but if the government backs you even after the fact, that feels a lot more like an act of war with plausible deniability. And in this case I think there might be a motivation for Poland to view it that way, since allowing Russian action against NATO countries invites more of the same, and Russia absolutely does not want to give NATO an excuse to retaliate in any way.
Countries refuse extradition for many reasons: they lack a reciprocal agreement with the other country, laws against extraditing citizens, laws against extraditing residents to face potential execution, etc.
While Russia is the Nazi Germany of examples, refusing to extradite a person doesn't automatically mean anything.
Of course, if someone wanted to go to war with Russia, it makes for a wonderful pretext.
Even if you had evidence that this were the case, you might not do anything, as with Saudi involvement with 9/11.
But that is where you are going wrong. If the US would want to attack Canada they would absolutely use that as a cause for war. If they don't want to go to war then even an straight up Canadian military attack can be brushed aside as "navigational error during a training exercise" or "regrettable rogue elements in the Canadian military".
This is not the court of law. The important factor is not if the evidence is strong or weak. The important factor is not if the perpetrator was acting in concert with a government or not. The important factor is if the country wants to go to war or not. Everything else falls in place after that.
By changing the traffic lights you can cause a traffic collapse in the whole city.. and a kid can do it:
https://interestingengineering.com/innovation/the-fantasy-of...
> Youtube user VolteGe, who says he is too young to drive, has nevertheless created a MIRT controlled by an Arduino microcontroller.
ADSB spoofing can cause massive problems for the air traffic control, and software for that is open source, works on a $200 sdr with a touchscreen and a gui.
FM transmitters are cheap, and remembering the "war of the worlds", anyone can create panic for $20
etc.
With Ukrainian forces now striking deep in Russia, that cold war is heating up. This is a reminder that that can work both ways and might soon start affecting Nato territory as well. All deniable of course. But a few high profile attacks like this sends a not so subtle message that Russia can escalate as well if they want.