During a recent off-the-record meeting, a senior government official warned that cyber attacks on United States in 2013 will be worse than they were in 2012, a year during which they reached a peak. (Participants were free to use what they were told, but not to disclose the names or venue).
Representatives of private corporations in the audience were told that there is not one whose computers have not been hacked. The official appealed to self interest (“you spend scores of millions on brand ‘D’ and someone else brings it to the market at a fraction of the cost, after stealing the fruits of your studies”), communitarian concerns (“don’t let your computers be used as a basis for attacking others”), and patriotism (“our systems are only one-third secure”). He pointed out that beyond stealing trade and defense secrets, computer hackers destroyed the data of the computers of Saudi Aramco, and warned that they could easily bring down our infrastructure, from the electrical grid to banking.
Read more at The National Interest.