Defending Digital Democracy

For Debora Plunkett, joining forces with the Belfer Center’s Defending Digital Democracy project was much more than an academic opportunity—it was her duty as an American. Russian meddling in the 2016 election “hit at the core of me as an American,” she said. “I am offended that anyone would try to limit, distort, or alter the rights of Americans to vote, and so I’m interested in helping to develop and deliver security guidance that will help campaigns better understand and respond to current-day cyber threaats and vulnerabilities.”

In July, the Belfer Center launched a new, bipartisan initiative called the Defending Digital Democracy Project  (D3P). Led by Belfer Center Co-Director Eric Rosenbach, along with the former campaign managers for Hillary Clinton and Mitt Romney, the project aims to identify and recommend strategies, tools, and technology to protect democratic processes and systems from cyber and information attacks.

As Director and Co-Director of the Belfer Center, Ash Carter and Eric Rosenbach have inherited from Graham Allison the world’s No. 1-ranked university think tank. They intend to build on that success by sustaining the Center’s core mission while widening its aperture; enhancing its unique ability to leverage science and technology to meet global challenges; and priming the next generation of leaders in both scholarship and policymaking.

In this issue, new Belfer Center Director Ash Carter and Co-Director Eric Rosenbach describe their vision for the Center’s next chapter: sustaining its core mission while enhancing its unique ability to leverage science and technology to meet global challenges and priming the next generation of leaders in both scholarship and policymaking.

We highlight two new initiatives: the Defending Digital Democracy (D3P) Project and the Arctic Initiative, and welcome 12 new senior fellows. Ash Carter gives a definitive history of the campaign to defeat ISIS, and Center experts offer insight into the North Korean nuclear threat and into the Iran nuclear agreement.

The information assembled here is for any campaign in any party. It was designed to give you simple, actionable information that will make your campaign’s information more secure from adversaries trying to attack your organization—and our democracy

Former Pentagon “cyber czar” Eric Rosenbach is Co-Director of Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and head of the new Defending Digital Democracy project. Rosenbach outlines the various cyber threats against American election systems and democratic processes – and how to better protect our democracy from nation-state attacks.

SPOILER ALERT: Foreign intervention in American politics is as old as our republic. John Adams warned about it in his inaugural address in 1797.

Long before 2016, foreign governments were targeting Republican and Democratic campaigns, trying to influence the way our government operates. This is a serious problem, and it threatens our nation’s sovereignty. It’s something we didn’t even think about when I started working on presidential politics in 2000.

The Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School launched a new, bipartisan initiative today called the “Defending Digital Democracy” (DDD) Project.