March 2014 Page 11
SEIDENBERG
The Honors Herald
A Missed Opportunity Daniel Rings, Contributor Daniel Rings is a senior Computer Science major, allegedly graduating this spring. This editorial is based on excerpts from his thesis paper, which also researches other countries’ cyber actions.
The past decade has seen a huge increase in the use of cyberspace as a medium for espionage. Many countries have formed dedicated cyber teams to focus on offensive and defensive state-sponsored cyber attacks. Here in the United States, we’ve heard a lot of hyperbole in recent years about how the Chinese are constantly launching attacks on American assets, particularly intellectual property. This is no small claim, although it often becomes marginalized as a political tool and serves only as a sound bite during election season rather than as a topic of serious policy changes. It is important to know exactly what is known at this point about attacks on intellectual property that are sanctioned by the People’s Republic of China. Industries, in their intended form, depend on the rules of intellectual property being respected. On top of that, intellectual property is very important in American society in particular because it, in its intended form, upholds the value of the individual. During the Burning of Washington in the War of 1812, the US Patent Office was one the only government buildings left standing because the British were persuaded that raiding such individual ingenuity would amount to nothing more than barbarian looting. In February of 2013, the Mandiant Corporation released a report detailing cyber attacks on United States entities in the last seven years. Intellectual property was the most common target. Mandiant had found that the vast majority of attacks had originated from a single group of hackers operating out of one
hackers operating out of one office building on the outskirts of Shanghai. The office building is inhabited by Unit 61398 of the People’s Liberation Army – a team of cyber experts in the Chinese army. Although the Chinese government denies responsibility for the attacks, the Mandiant report all but proves the attacks occurred under the direct knowledge and command of the Communist Party of China. There was a brief outcry at the time, but nothing concrete ever occurred to change the status quo. It is
But how can a country that prides itself on civil liberty also indiscriminately gather 5 billion records a day of cellphone location data? important that this be addressed for two reasons. For one, it devalues the individual imagination that America claims to hold in such high esteem. More immediately relevant, it fosters an incredible amount of uncertainty, which has an extremely suppressive effect on economic growth. Whatever favorable position the United States may have had in policy formation on this issue, however, has completely evaporated. In the past year, the revelations of the National Security Agency’s scope of surveillance have completely reversed any perceived moral legitimacy the US would have had on international cyber policy. To be sure, signals intelligence is an absolutely necessary part of sensible modern
international relations and law enforcement. It does preemptively reduce violent confrontation and provide a whole host of other advantages to our society. But how can a country that prides itself on civil liberty also indiscriminately gather 5 billion records a day of cellphone location data? How can a government whose first amendments to its founding document specifically limit its power, particularly in the courtroom, also rely on secret interpretations of law to aid in prosecuting its own citizens? How can a civilization characterized by rugged individualism also grant its government access to all communication made via common online communication providers? How can a culture that places George Orwell’s 1984 on a pedestal give in to such flagrant abuses of power? The surveillance program is morally way out of line, but perhaps Washington does not respond to such reasoning. In that case, we should also consider how weak we have made our position in international cyber policy formation – something that has real economic consequences as well. We have shot ourselves in the foot because of this. Again, a strong cyber intelligence force is needed in a modern global government. And the motivations for its actions are almost certainly benevolent. “Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.” Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Yahoo, YouTube, AOL, Skype, Apple and Paltalk C.S. Lewis