Science, Technology, and Public Policy

On March 15, the U.S. DoJ released an indictment against four Russians in one of the most significant hacking-related law enforcement actions to date. Cyber Security Project's Charley Snyder and Dr. Michael Sulmeyer discuss the indictment and its implications.

Vivek Mohan discusses the National Security Agency, surveillance, and cyberspace norms in a Post-Snowden world. 

"...[A]mong the informed public, fear of misuse of personal information is not limited to a wary eye towards cyber criminals — increasingly, concern has been voiced at the increasing power of the government in electronic surveillance."

In "Decrypting the Fifth Amendment: The Limits of Self-Incrimination in the Digital Era," Vivek Mohan and John Villasenor examine the scope of information protected from compelled self-incriminating disclosure by exploring the boundaries of the contents of the mind. They propose a framework for bringing the foregone conclusion doctrine, which was articulated in 1976, into the digital era, and conclude that the question of what constitutes a "testimonial act" must be revisited to proactively ensure that emerging technologies do not eviscerate the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination.

The risks posed by the proliferation of cyber weapons are gaining wide recognition among security planners. Yet the general reaction of scholars of international relations has been to neglect the cyber peril owing to its technical novelties and intricacies. This attitude amounts to either one or both of two claims: the problem is not of sufficient scale to warrant close inspection, or it is not comprehensible to a non-technical observer. This seminar challenged both assertions.

"The recent hacker exchange should also remind us that just as hacking could escalate to the use of conventional force in the Middle East, the reverse is also true. Bombing Iran, for example, could unleash an Iranian government cyber attack. Israelis say they could handle that, despite the recent evidence to the contrary. Unfortunately, much of the critical infrastructure in the U.S. is still not ready for a sophisticated nation-state cyber attack either."

Cyber-warfare is no longer science fiction and the debate among policy-makers on what norms will guide behavior in cyber-space is in full swing. The United Nations (UN) is one of the fora where this debate is taking place exhibiting an astonishing rate of norm emergence in cyber-space. Most recently, Russia together with China proposed an “International code of conduct for information security” in September 2011 after the U.S. reversed its long-standing policy position in 2010.

"Cybersecurity is a means to enable social stability and promote digital democracy; a method by which to govern the Internet; and a process by which to secure critical infrastructure from cybercrime, cyberespionage, cyberterrorism and cyberwar. As nations and corporations recognize their dependence on ICT, policymakers must find the proper balance in protecting their investments without strangling future growth."