By JDavid Derosier

 

Accusations

The CIA has accused Russia of interfering in the 2016 presidential election by hacking into Democratic and Republican computer networks and selectively releasing emails. According to the Washington Post, former NSA director Michael V. Hayden has stated that Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election was the “most successful covert influence operation in history”.

Cnet.com reported that In May of this year, Karim Baratov was sentenced to five years in prison for using data stolen in a massive Yahoo data breach to gain access to private emails. Working with agents from the Russian intelligence agency called FSB, Baratov hacked into email accounts hosted by Google. The same agents were also allegedly responsible for the 2014 hack of Yahoo. Yahoo has confirmed that more than 500 million accounts were breached.

 

Propaganda and election influencing by the USA.

Did you know that the United States created Radio Free Europe as an overt propaganda effort during the Cold War, partially funded by CIA? Did you know that Radio Free Europe continues to this day with headquarters in Prague, a corporate office in Washington, D.C., and 17 local bureaus in countries throughout their broadcast region, broadcasting in 25 languages to 23 countries including Armenia, Russia, Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan? (www.RFERL.org).

The U.S. has meddled in presidential elections in other countries as many as 81 times between 1946 and 2000, according to a database amassed by political scientist Dov Levin of Carnegie Mellon University (www.dovhlevin.com/).

From Radio Free Europe to influencing elections, USA has a well-documented history of meddling in other countries’ affairs.

 

Think the Russians are going to try and interfere again?

I’m sure they will.

And why shouldn’t they? Especially when we do the same thing all the time.

So, if YOU think the Russians are going to try and interfere again, is that a problem?

 

What is the problem?

In an earlier article, I wrote that problems cannot be solved…until they are broken down into issues to define the problem.

In this case, the problem is not that the Russians want to meddle in American elections; the problem is that apparently, we do not have adequate counter-measures to stop them.

There is no question that we have equal or better offensive capabilities than our adversaries. We need to put more effort into having better defensive capabilities – cyber defenses in the Digital Environment. And, we should stop complaining about others, like Russia, doing what we’re doing. Just be quiet and don’t let it happen.

 

The Digital Environment

The Digital Environment is exploding exponentially in terms of its breadth and capabilities and will continue to do so (I touched upon this in my article on “Changing Technology “).

Our lives are becoming increasingly dependent on the health and security of the Digital Environment.

Automation, machine learning, artificial intelligence, the Internet-of-Things (IoT), and many other advances bring tremendous opportunities…and also tremendous challenges to the Digital Environment.

Today the push is to protect privacy in the Digital Environment. That’s all well and good. However, we need to do a lot more in optimizing the security of the Digital Environment for Americans, not just privacy.

When governments collaborate with criminal hackers, such as mentioned above, it allows the governments to distance themselves from the direct perpetrators. This makes it more and more difficult to pinpoint the blame…and to point the finger at them.

 

We need to lock the barn door before the horse leaves, not point fingers afterward.

On other topics…

• REMEMBER – KNOWLEDGE IS POWER. GET OUT AND VOTE…for or against the Bond Issue and for candidates.
• Congratulations to my friend and former mayor, Essie Bellfield, for being recognized once again for her contributions to Orange. Salem UMC is naming an education building after Ms. Bellfield, a longtime member of the congregation.
• My next article will address strategies being discussed and put into place at the national level in the Digital Environment to add more security for Americans and our allies.

 

1. David Derosier consults with small business on planning and marketing issues, and provides web design and hosting services through OhainWEB.com, an accredited business with the Better Business Bureau that is rated A+ by BBB. He can be reached at JDAVID@Strategy-Planning.info