Im going to call her out and shes going to hide somewhere is meg king. Some of you may not know meg but she runs her Science Technology and Innovation Program and is responsible for the schools we have on fridays to teach capitol hill staff about cyber and Artificial Intelligence and todays genius, that would be ben buchanan, is there go to guy when we teach them both schools and hes been trying to teach me for while. I think ive been the repeater of all time at some of those schools. Im kind of getting it that i havent analog rain and i thank him for his patients. Ben is a global fellow and he will discuss his latest book right now called sub the hacker and the state. Spoiler alert hackers to change the world. How . Been maxis Cyber Operations are an fellow glee part of International Relations in the gap between United States and other countries has narrowed considerably. Get that folks, narrowed considerably pared from north koreas efforts to hack for cash Million Dollars worth against the bank of thank england to russias maligned activity for misinformation to electric lockouts in ukraine there is plenty to talk about. Understanding how cyber tools are used and abused is his specialty and also taking care of analog brain logs. Hes a marshall scholar and received his ph. D. From Kings College in london and he knows everything. Even more important though ive said this then is beloved here. As a former member of congress that would be me who tried to ensure Technical Intelligence collection tools werent cumbersome or legal and regularly reviewed by experts to prevent abuses i really salute ben for the kind of teaching he is doing for all the hill staffers to come here not knowing enough about the subject and not knowing about each other in the contribution he has made is just colossal. My theory is i have just hinted at the politicians are analog but the problems are digital and the Wilson Center is trying to change that. The moderate the conversation with ben the genius is courtney qb of nbc news. Courtney is a correspondent covering National Security and the military and has spent a lot of time reporting on the intelligence and digital issues we are discussing today especially election interference. Did you know theres election interference and it really means a lot to us for courtney to come here and do this and take a little time away from the endless conversation about our ongoing primary election. Courtney thank you so much and over to you. Enjoy everybody. Thank you very much. We have ben the genius and courtney the adequate so hopefully we will learn a bit but i do have one little thing that is i got an early copy of desperate and one of the few people do is have the luxury of being able to read Cyber Attacks and the new normal of geopolitics the hacker and the state. Its a fascinating read we are lucky to have ben your tear tell us more about it. Can you give us a basic overview of what the thesis is that the book . Too often we talk about packing between nations as a hypothetical like a nuclear war. Something thats off in the distance like cyber of pearl harbor and 9 11 and the thesis of this book as this is the long dausch wrong way to look at it. In fact it happens every single day. Its not an extraordinary activity but a daily one and part of the way in which nations compete in the modern era of statecraft and project power. What i wanted to do was take the discussion above a very academic hypothetical theoretical and make it very real. These are the stories of how nations hack one another and why nations have one another and this is what it means. Every chapter in the book has a different way in which nations tap fiber cables to hacking banks to steal cash to blackout symbiont. I want to tell the story of what happens every day. The sickly you are looking at , Many Americans around the world see Cyber Attacks and Cyber Espionage is a potential for mass casualties and chaos like you are looking at the space in between like the gray matter what happens in hacking every single day. We will get into some of the specifics in the cases that you detail in the book at how would you characterize a cyber attack on the nation, it nations to nation how does a generally look today . Make your waiting for a cyber attack of planes crashing in cities burning you missed the activities about the most and most activities that actually happen. What we do see between nations is persistent and pervasive espionage the United States china russia and Cyber Capabilities as tools of espionage. We in some circumstances the attacks into blackouts caused by Russian Hackers in ukraine. We also see what i called destabilization operations elections being the primary example of those of the nation saying we are going to use hacking tools to interfere in an adversarys election. These are the categories of activities of destabilization almost everything waste since he fits in one of those buckets and Little Wonder that involves casualties that its important. He would say todays Cyber Attacks are more pervasive but less destructive than in the past . Sort of insidious harm that happens. Its closer to Climate Change than a forest fire. Explain in the book one of the major reasons nations hack one another is this endless struggle to dominate for domination over the countries especially the domination over the world. Do you still believe thats true . Yes. And has hacking become harder to prevent that was in the past . Not only is it harder to prevent that nations are getting more aggressive. This is essentially a study of whats happened in the last 20 or so years in the hacking business between nations and what we see is nations are Getting Better and less inhibited. If you look at russia economical case if you go back 10 or 15 years russia was a very stealthy actor in cyberspace. They were in contrast to the chinese smash and grab workers russia was methodical and slow and hide behind the raider. Were seen since then is a russia that got more aggressive is much more capable. Imagine the two blackouts in ukraine and certainly everyone here knows about the election interference of 2016 but theres the attack in 2017 probably the most destructive cyber attack and history did 10 million in damage around the world and thats the lowest estimate also perpetrated by russia. Not only are hackers Getting Better but they are getting more aggressive you. You mentioned ukraine twice at russia attacked ukraine power grid in 2016. Would you believe russias goal was in that . Was it messaging for destructive measures in ukraine or messaging to the world that had the capability . If it was destructive measures they certainly fell short of their goal. The firstever publicly known blackout caused by a cyber attack it appears these attackers did less damage and they held Something Back which leaves the question what were they trying to do if it wasnt an allout attack. What were they trying to do . The first is that some kind of tester finding the capability and the second is this is some kind of the signal of russias thing to ukraine or to the world we have had this capability. The thing that you all have long feared causing a blackout was a cyber attack and we can do that was particularly remarkable especially the 2016 blackout is the tool the russians deployed to carry out the attack was automated and more scalable and it seems could work against American Power system as well. That may be a suggestion not just ukrainians but americans and a capability in our arsenal and we are afraid to use it. Specifically in 2016 good that allow the or other allies the ability to put in some sort of a preventative measure for something that couldnt happen in the u. S. . It certainly tip the russians hands and showed how the russians would would carry this out and develop a different capability that certainly possible and could america improve its defense is . One hopes when you see a hypothetical here blackouts become real. Certainly elections are something that gets a lot of attention in the United States and its not all doom and gloom. You are making progress on the electorate security front. Another thing that gets a lot of attention is bank attacks or anything that involves a large financial vocation. Congressman harman mentioned banking. There are things ive never heard about. Spanning its remarkable ambition that the North Koreans have. This is a country that probably is the most isolated sanctioned country on earth and one of the ways that they get hard currency for the regime is to hack other sites. Their most famous hack is the hack against the bank of bangladesh and the central bank in the country where they aspire to steal upwards of a billion dollars. The accounts these interactive Banking System and the initiate transfers from the new york fed that the North Koreans control. Whats funny about this case is they made some type of transfer so some of the transfers were blocked and they only got 81 million instead of the almost 1 billion. It mice be one of the most expensive typos in history that the austrians made. Whats significant is that showed the efficient of north korea and stops there. Its a much broader campaign. They hack cryptocurrencies with a great deal of success and they have also had the operation against the bank of india hacking atms all over the world and withdrew the money and decentralized russia so it characteristic of north korean they continue to evolve. When you say north korean operation this is something that the state run sanction funded . Carried out a hackers directed by the North Koreans. This is a priority for the regime to raise hard currency and hack is one way they do it. Another thing that surprised me was he wrote the north korea operators that opens up the next question if they are risk tolerance and do they ever seem that doesnt care about International Norms and laws and whatnot what you think they could do next in the hacking world . Yes is only question i dont want to say that this is real but one hypothetical thing that has been raised if north korea becomes the leading transactional interference of the integrity of the Financial System with a become the leading manipulating transaction interfering with the integrity of the system in order to do damage and any banker would tell you that these transaction records are at the core of our modern Financial System and one worry at this point hypothetical worry is that north korea might come back to bank hacking not for the purpose of funding the machine bridging the hunchback against the left. We are talking hacking and you talk about cyberapps via nagy. Theres one specific case and again i found fascinating so illustrative of the cat and mouse theme that exists in in cyberespionage and its called a byzantine candor. Its a Chinese Group a codename for a chinese hacking group. It was the essentially a spare fishing campaign in early 2000. Can you tell about how it started and how it evolved at the time . The byzantine candor being the codenamed for this. I dont name these things than what was striking about the byzantine candor with their reach. They were striking many targets across the United States. They were spearfishing to get access to the computers of american officials and polling information back and whats striking is what the nsa did. A single Intelligence Agency says rep to stop this. The chinese operatives who are part of the army were hacking in the hack those computers and hack the home network of a chinese act are and they hack the Broader Network that was turning out these operations may hack the Internet Company so they could look at the billing records and confirm who is behind these activities . The use that information to go and be ready to defend against the pats. A cat and mouse game happens in cyberspace a daily competition. All of those was secret. Its endemic. Commonly used between the time the u. S. Was able to counter size on china and how many they make its been unfolding years and is worth saying this was one battle and a much broader war or when the espionage case in a broader campaign. It was one case in which nice tasted very well but there are many in which the chinese activity went uninhibited an expensive Chinese Campaign against a military invasion and the warplanes. The chinese hackers pulled out reams of information about displaying. The information is done to. They just make lists of filenames in the filenames and say okay we could reach ones artwork and it gives you a sense will be used point at the chinese explained how they were able to. The would have computers in thirdparty countries and then they would hack the United States from those computers and the operation or just a scraper they hacked back was they had to hack these thirdparty computer sources which have no idea they were hacking their systems and they went upstream and eventually made their way into the chinese networks. Its not just the chinese to do this. Every nation takes precautions to disguise the hand carrying out Cyber Espionage. The russians have extensive things that they were doing for period of time or they would hack Satellite Phone coming occasions and beam it down to africa because they thought western intelligence might not be looking and western intelligence agents were looking so its this constant game of trying to hide your hand so you get more freedom of operations. No blamed this is an example of nsa taking a very offensive role and it paid off in the end. It was essential for them but i was surprised by the characterization of the pla and if you would indulge me for just a second its a short mention but it describes the plas actions specifically because the chinese hackers were demonstrating a lack of discipline and Operational Security and they sometimes even logged in on their personal email accounts to check stock portfolios and watch pornography. All true. Theres two reasons why some one would be sloppiness business. The first is everyone has a budget and you can imagine the chinese hackers have a boss who wants him to hit more targets faster and they are going to be sloppy and take shortcuts and the second is they get or do they get lazy. They decide hey the chances of getting caught are exceptionally low so why not . We think of the economical stockard that the person in the hoodie behind a keyboard and in this case of someone checking their facebook profile. You focus quite a bit on the shuttle broke or so. Tell us about them and what youve learned about the shadow brokers. The shadow brokers of the single biggest mystery in the world of Cyber Operations and i think every author has their white whale that one story that every journalist has it as well the shadow brokers are mine. At some point in 2016 an essay tools incredibly powerful hacking tools. Its like fishing with dynamite. It came on twitter and other platforms and proceeded for about 11 months or so continually posting the an essay tools and a stop. And theres theories about who did and theories about why they did it. Many people guessed it was russian intelligence as a way of taking arrows out of the quiver it led to the devastating Cyber Attacks. Two attacks won by the North Koreans won by the russians along with other capabilities. One of the attacks was the most destructive cyber attack in history 10 billion in damage. Through four years later we cant pin it down we dont know who did it and thats why its one of the most significant leaks of classified information ever. I think they made it clear that they wanted money. Was this just nothing more than a criminal enterprise . Thats certainly a theory. The shadow brokers talk all the time if they got paid enough money they would stop. A former insider former contractor decided this was something they would do to get money and disappear. And its remarkable we still dont know. Opens up another interesting idea when it comes to hacking and Cyber Espionage and im not everyone had a chance to see an nsa phone program that cost 100 million from 2015 to 2019 but produced only two unique things and its based off of an ig report that questioned whether in fact this was an efficient use of money. It gives us to the larger issue of policy and oversight. Is there enough oversight of the u. S. Government Cyber Espionage and hacking . As is the congressman said at the outset this is an activity that incredibly complex. Its described as one of the simpler an essay collection programs. The biggest challenge in overseeing this program is understanding it. The role is a particularly tricky business. What happens with the change in strategy in the last couple of years . The military arm to carry south american hacking operations and for military operations has been clear the last two years than once to be more aggressive in i call the strategy persistent engagement. They want to take the fight to the adversary networks and be less shy about pushing back not just from a deterrence perspective but it degrading and denying perspective keeping adversaries from doing what they want to do. The question of scholars say is that going to work . These are questions that congress should be asking in classified sessions words were appropriate to ask and answer them. You are someone who provides a lot of guidance. Do you think that oversight at this point is adequate . Do think theres enough attention to it . There so much going on all the time. Its a question of not just the oversight of how adept it is given how complex some of these programs are and how complex some of the jurisdictions are. Versus an Armed Services the city overseen by the officers in the bank. Do you think there needs to be a standard rule of ethical practice that exists that specifically with hacking and the u. S. Government did you have to tier two . Yes governments policies on that they govern activity. The broader question that is more pessimistic is can we get other nations to agree to a standard and can we have norms the way we have had norms and other categories of warfare and the way we seen technologies emerge in the past and then we build mars to try to counteract them. This is an opportunity for serves the interest of all all nations or at least the procedures of all nations to compete in cyber space in the norms that have been outlined with the u. N. Have been very highlevel and general. Some of the nations that conduct the most if im the west lawson west iran or korea china russia who dont seem to adhere to any practices or norms. Have they because of that or they Getting Better and have they surpassed the united United States in a capabilities . Away like to phrase it is the United States has the nicest rocks that we still live in a very glasshouse so when it comes intricate and dont use this word lightly dutiful cyber offense american capabilities are truly extraordinary. Talking about stuxnet an extraordinary operation against the Nuclear Program but just because we can do that doesnt mean we can defend very well and get this long vulnerability better adversaries have not been shy about exploiting to their recent equifax indictment where the chinese basically because they could hack the personal information of 140 million americans probably almost everyone here who has a credit card is likely in this file by equifax. This is a case in which most americans dont know these companies exist. The companies are clearly not defending it adequately but its reams of information about american adults. Thats the glasshouse part of it. At what point and this is more the military side but at what point do these attacks if we are talking about something in a gray area but not destructive loss of life or chaos in the street at what point do you want are these attacks the beginning of a cyberwar that could lead to a kinetic war . That point we have not yet found a whats remarkable is was we kept pushing back so in 1999 the russians carried out in Espionage Campaign called moonlight maze against Unclassified Networks in the United States in the deputy secretary of fred defense john hamrick came to the classified briefings where in the middle of the cyber war. This is what cyber war was at the time and they spun up the apparatus to find out how we would respond. They didnt go war but they get ready to push back. Now that seems almost passe. Along the way we said there must be some red lights or whether its doing a billion damage of damage were killing someone or turning up the lights or whether selection of interference in time and time again we kept it redefining this gray zone to allow more things to fit closer. When the biggest policy questions for any administration is to say wheres the lion and what the activity we are going to punish and what causes it to enact that punishment in bus far both parties have been willing to say well let the combination play out. Did the saudis not sure i know what the answer is. Is want to make sure theres a strategy and the hill can say what is the strategy here and what is the plan for reducing or mitigating the threat on the various factors like china and russia here. I think there is some overhang of deterrence where no one is going to kill in a cyber attack. What about attributions . Has the u. S. Gotten better at attributions and at what point without some sort of smoking gun without some sort of smoking gun how can there be a kinetic response and then potentially shows sources and methods of how they were voltage terminate . It this is one of the big questions, can we figure out who it is and the conventional wisdom for a long time was unlike the cold war is virtually impossible. If the United States saw it newer was coming from the thinking here is we wont know where a cyber attack is coming from. Anyone could do this. Whats striking this complexity and attribution we make it seem harder than it actually is. Take the saudi hack. North koreas hack sony in 2014 destroyed 70 of saudis Creative Infrastructure according to one estimate and got these juice emails about Angelina Jolie in the question emerges who did this . Some folks in the industry say we dont know what it was in north korea. It emerges that time the way the United States knew with certainty that it was korea was the United States was in the north korean networks. I think its emblematic of how a nation does attribution many cases. Its not just forensic evidence, its also hacking adversaries and hacking them for so much what they are doing but that is the cat and mouse game that happens every single day. This is what they uncovered afterthefact. Like so much else in cyber space he gets into the messy thank you of competition one more time. And thats obviously not something which is why some folks it is not credible. Snooki said say the u. S. Is Getting Better at determining attribution in a more concrete way . For sure. And other nations as well . United states is but it certainly is the case that other nations appear to have Counter Intelligence against the u. S. Go to back to the shadow brokers predict that was a russian adversary that was an extraordinary counterintelligence attack and never felt tremendous access to some known mechanism to an essay files and presuming great insight into how the an essay one about its business. I want to talk a little bit about Election Security because you have a fascinating story in the book of june of 1940 and the audience was surprised to us interfering in the elections in 1940. I do know the story until i wrote the book. Its striking. Go back to 1940 the tenth. Making history world war ii had begun the United States is not yet in it written as fighting a tough battle with germany and britain had the party which was to get Franklin Roosevelt reelected. Hes running for his third term hes a pro war democrat and they worry he wont win reelection so they tried to influence who the republicans put up as the nominee against him. Republican conventions and chaos trying to determine who the nominee will be another live comes the poll saying a man named wendell the former democrat was leading it would be the favorite choice. This poll was fabricated by British Intelligence and i was one part of the campaign to make wendell who was a pro war former democrat republican at the time the republican nominee make roosevelt defeat him in the fall and get republicans voted out of congress. Election interference is not new. The United States has done it. What is new in what is striking is how hacking operations can supercharge this old coolest tool of statecraft in the hacking operations like we saw in 2016 supercharge effectiveness and thats whats striking and thats what i like about studying this stuff the complacent and Historical Context and get much more appreciation for its death. In the 2014 to 2016 election we see as being the biggest threat for 2020 and is there anyway the u. S. Can do anything about disinformation . What worries me is the same election businesses elections have two purposes. The first is to pick a one and the second is to pick the loser. Election interference operations can interfere. It can try to change voters minds with an imposed campaign a contrite he change votes of the Hacking Campaign nor can cause chaos and try to get the winner to think they have won and the loser to think they won and you can imagine that was a larger complexity in 2020 and i worry about operations that might happen that could threaten to perceive the vote even if the vote is legitimate but if its perceived as legitimate that interferes with the peaceful transfer of power is so essential democracy. What about some of their potentials like china. What would you see as the biggest threat for how they threaten the election and. Chinas tricky and we dont have the track record than we have with russia. This is with russia but history tells us election interference with the caught active influence campaign to something they have done for decades going back to the early days of the keychain kgb and the russian secret intelligence service. They may have the motivation and the capability but its hard to know what if anything youll do in 2020. It causes policymakers to take a step back and as will begin find out for threats notches from russia but around the world. In the u. S. Do anything that will absolutely stop foreign interference . That theres no perfect security system. There are things we can do to improve election integrity. Everyone should vote on a voter verified paper ballot and you can use the paper trail to track the voters intent. Most states have this but not all. Afterthefact we should do is call the risk limiting audit which is a method to ensure the votes were counted properly that goes beyond the account. Theres tremendous variety in the audit procedures day by day. And this is where the can help to come out and say we treat elections as critical infrastructure. We treat this as a core function of democracy and if you interfere in our election thats crossing the line they whats striking about what the russians did in 2016 and how few consequences they suffered for it. We have a couple minutes before you guys a chance to ask questions and i think theres some great questions. Before we do i have to ask you who do you think nation wise is the best i will use the word vast are most effective or the most dangerous hacker . Spent the most dangerous hacker are Russian Hackers. Its not only their hacking capability its the aggression and the risk tolerance turning out the power of massively unguarded Cyber Attacks interfering elections in largely suffering few consequences. I think thats a recipe for a nation thats going to continue to use this impressive capability in an emboldened and empowered wait way for someone in the United States thats worrisome. What is the one case in the book that you found the most fascinating and the most surprising and i want to say your favorite story of hacking but whats your favorite story of hacking . I think the shadow brokers team is remarkable not just because we have things we dont know in the ministry but because it shows how the tradecraft evolves and it evolves from espionage to be able to attack to those new terrain of hacking and not for publicity or Information Purposes but to actually have a tangible sector on the other side and whats striking about the shadow brokers we have seen other groups pop up like them but as a group on twitter called intrusion truth. No ones really heard of them and no one is aware of where they are coming from but they are posting in chinese capabilities doing attribution on chinese capabilities. We have seen leaks of iranian material that seems like a shadow brokers might be the vanguards of essentially counterintelligence in the public sphere that something that is simply extraordinary. You think the shadow brokers will emerge . That they merged an Election Year in an audit in 2020 so set your watches for this august. Im not sure but they came out at a time of high tension so they would certainly be striking and even a mystery they came back. Is a considering intelligence world and how do they look the shadow brokers . Of the fascinating thing about this case is we dont know. There has been so little public oversight on the shadow brokers. In contrast stealing 20 million security clearance files of American Government workers to the shadow brokers so are so rarely discussed but again everyone has a favorite chapter. By the favorite chapter thats the one because its an extraordinary story. We dont know what the Intelligence Community knows. A want to take a couple of questions from the audience. Serve. Michael waller, great conversation. My impression is the Power Rankings in hacking capabilities are a function of fiscal assets and intellectual capitol. If you were to do a heat map of the world and ranked the intellectual capitol function of that power country by country both in terms of current intellectual capitol and talent in the pipeline what would those rankings look like and from a policy perspective should the u. S. Be doing more to recruit more and better talent . Thank you. The United States probably still has the edge in terms of the sheer talent available. The nsa is United States largest employer of mathematicians which is usually very useful to four codebreaking. Israel certainly has incredibly ingenious hackers. Some of these operations are intricate and how they are carried out. Those three are a cut above the rest of we shouldnt sleep on russian operations. They have demonstrated for a long time they can play this game and an incredibly isolated country north korea has done a great job of being able to punch well above their weight. Jason gresham from the center from strategical studies. To great discussion about the book and i look forward to reading it. Im interested and you mentioned Election Security and the vein of the Election Security and those resilience measures that we can take from the United States government perspective to sort of come away from the whackamole approach in terms of cyberattacks and thinking along the lines of those measures and i was wondering your thoughts on that. You hear a lot can we educate people with information as part of the problem but i also wonder what platforms like facebook and twitter can do about them in the Security Officer alex stamos is very fond of saying freedom of speech shouldnt equal freedom of breach which is to say you may have the right in the United States as an american to Say Something thats not true but it doesnt mean facebooking simplify it and in the context in which we had not many months of her eight months until election season picks up is hard to educate the entire population but i do wonder if there are things that platforms can do to mend the content the goes viral. That is a tricky hill to go down and its something they are very wary of doing and i have to do to some degree but how they are managing this is something that certainly complex. This is a business where there are no easy answers. Technology Innovation Programs i just got your book this morning. Congratulations on its publication but i started reading it right away and i notice in your second footnote when you introduce shadow brokers you referred to these tools that they released that were on line and now they no longer are but we can still find them in the internet archives. One among many methods you are using to get at some of this information some of which seems to be classified and wondered if he could speak a little bit to some of the writing perhaps the great whale as your biggest mystery to really rely on some unique tools. This is the great thing about coming to the Wilson Center is you get questions about sputnik and its impressive. This is a broader. She that i make in how we study Cyber Operations. Think a lot of scholars like a set of the outset treat these capabilities as if they are hypothetical and theoretical. How do you find those cases . Theres an incredibly robust private sector that studies what nations do every single day in cyberspace because they defend many of the targets and big get great visibility in the use of intelligence that otherwise would be completely out in a published report in technical language. If you read all the footnotes based on these kinds of private sector analyses with highly credible analysts from the Intelligence Community and down the private sector tracking china and russia and the United States as they go about their business. Thats one source. The second source is Computer Science literature. We didnt talk a ton about it but there are two chapters in the book on encryption that essentially play out in maps. They are very accessible but they are fascinating and how it becomes a frontier for competition between nations. The Computer Science literature which is technical revealed and help sort through a lot of what happened in that case. The third source or government documents. Some of these documents are actively promulgated by the United States government russian and chinese hackers shut extraordinary light on how they go about their business. Some of these documents are every single footnote in this book points to something thats publicly available on line. Can be sure the russians and the chinese have seen in these documents tell a story about what happens in cyberspace between nations. Dave ottaway at the woodrow Wilson Center. We just came out of a cold war where theres a theory of deterrence. There was a theory and it worked on the ground. Is there any development of theory of deterrence in this new warfare and should the u. S. Become more aggressive in order to stop the attacks on the United States . Beyond some pretty high thresholds i am skeptical of deterrence to when it came to this book that comes through no most every chapter is that so many policymakers in so many scholars conceptualize Cyber Operations as operations for signaling purposes just click in the cold war where coercion and deterrence. Changing out the other side plays its hand. They are much better for not laughing at for stacking the deck. Thats a messy cat and mouse business and beyond some very high thresholds where we responded with the kinetic strike i think we probably overrate deterrence feasibility in this domain and we underestimate how useful it is as a tool of competition. The u. S. Is doing too much signaling or not enough shaping in the cyber world . I would have said that three or four years ago. After he started the book it changed its strategy and was much more strategic. Precision engagement is saying we are going to engage everyday and not worry about this. Ca just take credit that was your idea no one will push back on it. Newsbreaks are incredibly quickly broken them all use a bit of the trattou today what stories that broke the neck you wish the book include an why . I did write a very good description. Of the equifax breaches perpetrated by the Chinese Government in and two weeks ago the proper justice comes out with the official version of the story which lines up. I would have had a little more color and there would have been a few more paragraphs had they given me an advance copy of their indictment which they did not do. I was glad that i was correct but i think we could have had more details in the book if the department of justice had been activated earlier . Im an army officer in doing a thesis on russian political warfare. Theres kind of the debate is this just evolution nor revolution of military affairs . I think its revolution particularly with russia theres an extraordinary history. My colleague is writing a great look on the history of the russian active measures. They didnt invent this activity in 2016. What they did do is they supercharged it and they married their propaganda and their hackers and a powerful operation. Does that amount to revolution . A dont know. Maybe your thesis can answer it but it certainly is making this whole idea in making it much more powerful and much more dangerous for democracies like ours. There dont seem to be repercussions for. Is that one of the things that needs to happen in order for this to shift . Theres no doubt that the United States should draw a clear line on Information Operation saying well take these very seriously well punish you for the Obama Administration didnt have much time between the election and leaving office kicking russian agents of the country and close to consulates. He tried to impose some cost in the eight or so weeks that he had and its something we should go back to. Im a fellow at the carlisle group. Two questions. One is psychological operations are being used to impact and influence antifacts whether its election related themes to push people away from science lets say. Is that from a definition standpoint, do you consider that hacking or is it using public means that it then developed here in the u. S. That are accessible to everybody to essentially perpetrator put forward ideas that are then being shared by americans and others around the world. We can clarify that we can understand what we are talking about as if thats defined by hacking. The second one is to bring this conversation a little bit to the huawei conversation if as we are anticipating or we are seeing huawei is going to set the Technology Standard for 5g is relieved forward to the next generation. How will that impact the ability of china and others to use that hardware infrastructure to get what youve been studying in assessing and writing about in terms of information . I would not consider what you described in your first question is hacking but i would consider the Cyber Operation. The terms of the hacking Cyber Operations is competing in cyberspace. Its a wiretapping in space so i would consider what you describe is a Cyber Operation certainly disinformation well within the scope of what i studied in what i read about. Its most effective when you can identify fischer and drive that wedge and so much of what we have seen the russians do for a decade is to identify these points of debate or division and try to widen them and try to make both sides feel like the truth doesnt matter in science doesnt matter we are all divided here that serves the russian interests very well. We have seen not in the antifacts as you mentioned and probably will see it not just from russia but other coronavirus is well. These things are getting a lot of attention but not well understood by the body politics. On the second piece the huawei piece its impossible to talk by the thing that the role that Telecom Companies play in intelligence and how this is an advantage for many nations that they can work with the Telecom Industry to get access to information. It seems to me that one of the real things with huawei is china can do that as well so certainly since the concerns are founded thinking about do we want to let an adversary or potential adversary cat access to Telecom Networks . He would think its an easy solution which is ben huawei and maybe thats part of this solution but not the entire solution. They are much more complex questions about supply chains and no matter who the company is whos making the component parts. If maybe we get to a point where her realize everything is compromised and certainly if you go down the rabbit hole long enough the fact that theres always one more level of deception it seems kind of true. Thats in and of itself but we have a right to be concerned. So make you to worry about huawei but the u. S. Is becoming more of an island with its european partners. Do you think its a concern for security . My sense of studying the last 20 years of Cyber Operation every nation will use every tool available to compete in cyber space and its an opportunity that we would expect the chinese to try to use. You talk about coordination and how much at t has helped. Couldnt china make the reverse argument with a 5g infrastructure and they could then be as pervasive as is huawei theoretically. I think they certainly would and thats the cab and mouse game in the telecom. This is not a business where trust is a wise idea. This is a business where you should trust indefinitely should verify. Singer james fowler james fowler. My question really is what about hacking expertise for higher. North korea hires out to nationstate actors and people who have expertise for sale. How does that impact . This is a remarkable trend. I think iran is come on the cyber the cyber seen before that was available in the home grow a lot of their capability but you are certainly right to say a lot of nations look around the world and say hey we need cyber space as well as how can we get on board quickly . There companies that essentially higher up hacking expertise and you can go down the list of nations that have done this that have worked with companies to essentially level up there hacking capabilities and how to use those capabilities. Whats remarkable is that they use them not just to protect power against adversaries but to repress the hacking capabilities as a tool of maintaining control the population coupled with traditional physical policing. I think thats something, this is a book about nations but if you want to add one chapter about cybersecurity in Cyber Operations and domestic policy how authoritarian regimes use these tools. We are out of time. A fascinating discussion. You are absolutely a genius on this and we thank you for writing this book in a way that people like me can understand it and enjoy it. I have seen your reporting and you are a genius as well. I think you will for being here and there is a copy for sale in the lobby. Thank you. Thank you very much. [applause] the book that i most recently completed finished reading was the hundred year marathon which is chinas secret strategy to replace america as the global superpower. It was a book that was recommended by greg walden on
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