The cost-benefit of economic espionage
The US government insists it does not engage in economic espionage. But most nations are not abstaining from using their intelligence apparatus to steal trade secrets for the benefit of their private sectors, panelists at the Atlantic Council's Cyber Threat Wednesday said.
While the US opposes corporate espionage for moral reasons, as a practical matter, it doesn't engage in this practice because it doesn't have much of a reason to, said Dmitri Alperovitch of security firm CrowdStrike. The US is the world leader in intellectual property and technological innovation, Mr. Alperovitch said, and stands to lose more from such attacks than it could gain. That calculus could change over time, however. “If in 30 to 40 years, God forbid, we’re no longer No. 1,” Mr. Alperovitch said, “are we really going to take the same approach to get to first place – that we’ll never do [corporate espionage]? I’m dubious of that.”
There could be another reason why the US should not engage in economic espionage, now or later: We aren't set up for it. "The bumper sticker is: 'We shouldn't do it, because we would suck at it,'" said Stewart Baker, partner at Steptoe and Johnson law firm and former National Security Agency counsel. “You need what amounts to state champions who are well-integrated into the government, in a way that frankly US industry simply isn’t,” Mr. Baker said. “We’d get the occasional secret, but we wouldn’t get the things that are most valuable to the companies that we most wanted to help.”Read more. // Malena Carollo
While the US opposes corporate espionage for moral reasons, as a practical matter, it doesn't engage in this practice because it doesn't have much of a reason to, said Dmitri Alperovitch of security firm CrowdStrike. The US is the world leader in intellectual property and technological innovation, Mr. Alperovitch said, and stands to lose more from such attacks than it could gain. That calculus could change over time, however. “If in 30 to 40 years, God forbid, we’re no longer No. 1,” Mr. Alperovitch said, “are we really going to take the same approach to get to first place – that we’ll never do [corporate espionage]? I’m dubious of that.”
There could be another reason why the US should not engage in economic espionage, now or later: We aren't set up for it. "The bumper sticker is: 'We shouldn't do it, because we would suck at it,'" said Stewart Baker, partner at Steptoe and Johnson law firm and former National Security Agency counsel. “You need what amounts to state champions who are well-integrated into the government, in a way that frankly US industry simply isn’t,” Mr. Baker said. “We’d get the occasional secret, but we wouldn’t get the things that are most valuable to the companies that we most wanted to help.”Read more. // Malena Carollo
Chris Hadnagy on Def Con hackers posing as your coworkers
At a conference famous for its hackers, one of the most popular events requires no technical skill whatsoever. Rather than breaking into computers, contestants try to trick companies' well-meaning employees to give out valuable information. //Joe Uchill
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Should the US engage in economic espionage?
Passcode was the exclusive media partner at an event on economic espionage hosted by the Atlantic Council think tank. Here’s what we learned. // Malena Carollo
Michael Schrenk on stealing data your company gives away for free
In advance of his presentation at the Def Con conference in Las Vegas, Passcode spoke with Schrenk about the insider information he's paid to glean from the open Internet. // Joe Uchill
ACLU urges Supreme Court to hear cell phone location data case
The American Civil Liberties Union's Florida branch is petitioning the Supreme Court to take up a case that would establish if cell phone location data is protected under the Fourth Amendment.
The case centers around Quartavius Davis, who was suspected of participating in a string of robberies in 2010. Police got 67 days' worth of location data from his cell phone provider with a court order – but did not have a warrant. The ACLU says the records revealed "a great deal of sensitive information." Lower courts don't agree on whether cell phone location data should be protected by the Fourth Amendment, or if the US violated it by obtaining it without a warrant based on probable cause. //American Civil Liberties Union
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