Information Law: the Challenges of the Hybrid Warfare

Abstract

Background. An important role in informational confrontation to hybrid aggression is given to information law, which is intended to guarantee freedom of thought and ensure reliable protection of society and state from multidimensional information threats. In modern conditions, when the main vector of foreign-political struggle has finally shiftedto the sphere of information, information law became a necessary tool for ensuring national security, including ensuring by the wayof establishing information restrictions. At the same time, it remains the basic indicator of the level of democracy, which forces to consider its development through the prism ofcoordination of national interests and civil liberties. Against this backdrop, national security and the idea of the rule of law in the regulation of information relations become particularly acute.
Analysis of recent researches and publications. The issues of information law have been highlighted in the scientific works of many modern lawyers due to its extreme urgency. It has to be noted that most of the modern research on information law issues are carried out in the context of a stable (peaceful) foreign policy situation that is not typical for modern Ukraine.
The aim of the article is to outline trends, patterns and prospects of national information law development in the context of hybrid warfare.
Materials and methods. The set goal has resulted in the comprehensive use of general scientific and special legal methods of cognition, which allowed covering the key aspects of information law as a component of the information security system and the tool for the provision of information rights and freedoms. The laws of Ukraine, the decrees of the President of Ukraine, the works of domestic and foreign scientists were the information basis of the study.
Results. The article is devoted to the consideration of the current state and prospects of national information law development in the context of hybrid warfare, which causes the rapid emergence and change of the entire layersof public relations associated with the country's participation in information confrontation, the organization of security measures, the introduction of sanction regimes. The range of information threats of the hybrid war is outlined; their influence on the sphere of national security is analyzed. A set of measures aimed at improving the quality of legal information security is proposed.
Conclusion. The most effective preparation and realization of such measures is possible only within the framework of the state strategy, which would clearly define the priorities of the state information policy, outline the range of its subjects, and coordinate its activities at all organizational and territorial levels. Proceeding from the dualistic nature of information law, as an instrument of information restrictions and guarantees of information rights and freedoms, it is argued that the concept of its development in terms of hybrid warfare should include a mandatory search of a balance between the interests of national security and the ideas of the rule of law.