However, he argued that countries could collectively step back from the precipice, as it has been done in other forms of warfare, and establish laws, norms, standards and protocols.

"Trust has to be earned and continually validated and also accepting that a lack of trust exists between some stakeholders when it comes to cyber security. In this scenario we must be realistic but determined."

He added that it was important for companies to work together to identify the anti-security players, and made a list of who to watch out for:

"While the inclusion of governments on the list of cyber world adversaries seems incorrect given the outspoken nature of governments that vehemently decry those hacking their country, it is important to keep in mind that throughout history, spying and espionage have continually played a role in diplomacy, for better or worse," he wrote.

According to Suffolk, who cited two Forbes articles, "Meet the Hackers who sell Spies the tools to crack your PC (and get paid six figure fees)" and "Shopping for Zero Days: A Price List for Hacker's Secret Software Exploits", there is a vibrant industry in identifying and selling zero-day exploits. These are attacks on security vulnerabilities which happen as soon as those vulnerabilities are discovered.