无忧传媒

U.S. national and economic security depends on secure, trusted, and resilient technology. But digital threats keep聽disrupting聽critical聽systems in government and industry. The U.S. is straining to counter the threats despite spending billions of dollars on the problem year after year. And in the next two decades, officials expect聽聽as the digital and physical worlds merge.聽

The U.S. must take unprecedented action: It must design and activate a whole-of-nation cyber strategy and a supporting cybersecurity system. Seizing this opportunity will require聽a broader scope of聽effort,聽integration聽of cyber defense and offense聽to provide a credible deterrence聽policy,聽greater day-to-day collaboration between聽the public and private sectors聽in critical cyber domains, and the mobilization of the cyber technology and innovation base. 聽聽

To be sure, the Biden administration is directing major advancements and committing significant resources to improve the cybersecurity and resilience of聽听补苍诲听, much of which is privately owned and operated. U.S. officials are calling for聽. Such efforts can help deter cyber threats by denying hackers their objectives. 聽

To effectively get ahead of the threats, however, the nation must do聽4聽things: 聽

1. Broaden the Scope of Cybersecurity

The U.S. needs full-spectrum capabilities to both project聽power聽and defend against聽cyber聽espionage, sabotage, and influence operations聽emanating from聽a multitude of nation-states and criminal groups. This means developing policies, plans, programs,聽and activities for a whole-of-nation effort focused on full-spectrum cyber聽activities聽and actors. 聽

2. Leverage Offense and Defense

The U.S. must聽better integrate and聽synchronize the way it conducts cyber offense and defense with a refreshed national strategy, related policies,聽whole-of-government operating models,聽doctrine that goes beyond military minutiae, and greater clarity and deconfliction around roles and responsibilities.聽

What would success look like? For starters, defenders must capture the tactics, techniques,聽and procedures used by attackers and feed them to the National Security Agency and U.S. Cyber Command to support聽defense-led聽offensive operations. As the Pentagon鈥檚 policy chief聽聽earlier this year, the U.S. must deter cyber adversaries through punishment鈥攂y retaliating in cyberspace and other domains against those who attack the nation. Otherwise, cyber defense costs will become untenable. But that鈥檚 not all. 聽

The U.S. should broaden the military鈥檚 鈥渄efend forward鈥� concept to include 鈥渦sing all of the instruments of national power鈥� as the聽听耻谤驳别诲.听

What鈥檚 more, the government must find ways to capture insights from offensive cyber operations, anonymize them, and share them with defenders to accelerate defensive improvements. This is vital for making U.S. critical infrastructure resilient enough to withstand cyber attacks and sustain operations. And building greater resilience is essential if the U.S. expects to deter cyber threats without conflict escalating out of control.聽The nation needs to do this at 鈥渘et speed.鈥� 聽

3. Reimagine Public-Private Cooperation

The public and private sectors must improve cyber threat information sharing so that businesses gain access to actionable threat intelligence. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Director Jen Easterly聽聽information sharing the agency鈥檚 鈥渟uperpower鈥濃�攁nd it must be used to full advantage. CISA鈥檚 new Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative (JCDC) is a good first step to provide public and private partners greater shared awareness and analysis. Ultimately, what is needed is more face-to-face, side-by-side collaboration between government and industry professionals in a new national cybersecurity center. 聽

Through collaboration, the U.S. must advance its understanding of threats, develop countermeasures, take down malicious infrastructure, and intensify preparation, prevention, and recovery efforts. And when the nation overcomes digital threats, it must find ways to pass those methods to defenders. Armed with more actionable intelligence, organizations must ramp up proactive threat hunting to root out hackers hiding in their internal networks.聽

As U.S. National Cyber Director Chris Inglis聽, the private sector and government must work in an integrated, collaborative way to counter cyber threats. This should include not only broader real-time information sharing but also more federal resources to help critical infrastructure companies resist threats from nation-state adversaries. Also, when developing cyber strategies and operations, U.S. officials must be mindful of the聽on the private sector. 聽

Business leaders, in turn, should embrace the shared responsibility of building greater cyber resilience, as well as the opportunity for leading resilient companies to achieve improved economic performance over the long term.聽

The U.S. needs more collaboration on cybersecurity standards to make it easier for companies to focus on cyber defense聽mitigation聽rather than compliance. Also, stakeholders need more publicly available blueprints, off-the-shelf tools, grants, and funding to shore up cyber defense, building on the work of the National Institute of Standards and Technology.聽And officials must streamline increasingly complex regulations to ease burdens on medium and small businesses聽so they can focus on risk reduction and mitigation.聽

4. Build Novel Solutions

To create tomorrow鈥檚 cybersecurity solutions, the U.S. must harness the national cyber tech and innovation base. The government needs to cultivate the base鈥攂uilding on multibillion-dollar venture-capital spending鈥攁nd it should consider doing so with allied partners. Imagine, for example, an international cyber innovation ecosystem that lets the 鈥淔ive Eyes鈥� (the U.S., United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada), NATO, and Israel share best-of-breed technology. What鈥檚 more, the U.S. needs to assess the vast number of cybersecurity tools and products and ferret out the real best-in-class innovations. What's needed isn't more tools, but rather more integrated and proven solutions. 聽

The Biden administration has prioritized protecting the U.S. cybersecurity innovation edge. And the Pentagon鈥檚 Defense Innovation Unit (DIU)鈥攚hich has offices in Silicon Valley; Boston; Austin, Texas; and Washington, DC鈥斅爓ith CISA on cybersecurity initiatives. But there is more work to do. 聽聽

At 无忧传媒, we鈥檙e uniquely positioned to advance this聽fourfold vision for national cybersecurity. Our experience supporting U.S. government work in cyber defense and offense has given聽our cybersecurity practitioners聽a deep聽understanding of the adversarial mindset, tactics, techniques, and procedures used by聽nation-state聽threat actors. We know how to protect the missions of federal civilian, military, and intelligence organizations, as well as privately owned critical infrastructure businesses. And we鈥檙e investing in聽DarkLabs,聽an elite team of security researchers, penetration testers, reverse engineers, network analysts, and data scientists, dedicated to stopping cyber attacks before they occur.聽

It鈥檚 time to transform聽the聽U.S. national cyber capabilities听补苍诲听expand the nation's global competitive聽advantage.聽Together,聽government and industry聽must take聽a stand against advanced adversaries. 聽 聽