US Strategy Will Allow Hacking Criminal & Foreign Networks 

The Biden administration is set to unveil a national strategy that for the first time calls for comprehensive cyber security regulation of the nation's critical infrastructure, explicitly recognising that years of a voluntary approach have failed to secure the nation against cyber-attacks.

The 35-page document, titled “National Cybersecurity Strategy,” differs from the dozen or so similar papers signed by presidents in two significant ways: 

• First, it will impose mandatory regulations on a wide range of American industries. 

• Second, it will authorise US defense, intelligence, and law-enforcement agencies to go on the offensive, hacking into the computer networks of criminals and foreign governments, in retaliation to, or preempting, their attacks on American networks.

“Our goal is to make malicious actors incapable of mounting sustained cyber-enabled campaigns that would threaten the national security or public safety of the United States,” the document states in a five-page section titled “Disrupt and Dismantle Threat Activities,” according to a draft version. 

Under the new strategy, the US will “disrupt and dismantle” hostile networks as part of a persistent, continuous campaign. 

A new national cyber security strategy is certainly a positive development. In theory, increased supervision and participation from the government will keep organisations honest about their cybersecurity efforts and hold them responsible for their security. This should also have the corresponding effect of making organizations more resilient to attacks, which would positively impact larger cyber security issues, like reducing successful ransomware campaigns. This campaign will be co-ordinated by the FBI’s National Cyber Investigations Joint Task Force working in tandem with all relevant US agencies, a systematic collaboration that has rarely been attempted and never before publicised. 

Private companies, both firms that are frequent targets of cyber attacks and firms that specialise in cyber security methods, will be full partners in this effort, both to alert the government task force of intrusions and to help repel them. 

The new  US strategy acknowledges that industry cannot combat cyber threats alone and that this is not achievable without government involvement. A partnership with the government, which comes with additional resources and legal authority, is essential to mitigate risks from sophisticated threat actors and powerful nation-states.

White House:   Slate:    Federal News Network:     Washington Post:     Bloomberg Law:   Corporate Compliance: 

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