The issue of who is a better provider, the public or private sector, is not unique to cyber security. In fact, it is at the core of many of our country's most heatedly debate topics, such as health care and education. There are differing viewpoints on which sector is better suited to provide for our country. Proponents of the private sector argue that it is more efficient and less costly. While the public sector contends that public services are held accountable by the voting public, while corporations are accountable to no one but the stockholders -- and even then with mixed results.
In a few articles I discussed the planned expansion of federal power through the creation of an "internet killswitch" and "national cyber ID's". Most of the comments I received were weary of expanding the power of the government. I received comments questioning the federal governments capability to execute these tasks efficiently and comments fearing that we were heading closer to an Orwellian style dictatorship.
The second theme focused on the scope of government involvement in creating our security. I looked at NSA spying to gather critical intelligence and possible government involvement in cyber wars across the globe. While no one likes the idea of a massive government spying dragnet in our country, there are those who feel that since they have nothing to hide, they do not mind giving up some of their privacy if it means enhanced security. The idea is that if you are not making phone calls to anonymous cell phones in Afghanistan, the government has no reason to look into you. The fact that there are many people that hold this sentiment proves how lucky we are to live in the United States. I doubt there are many people who feel the same way in China, for example.
Lastly, I looked at the United States and Israel's possible involvement in the Stuxnet worm, the world's first precision-targeted cyber missile. This is also a tricky subject. Surely an attack on another nations infrastructure, whether cyber or physical, should be considered an act of war. On the other hand, no one wants to see Iran posses a nuclear weapon. This effectively set their development team back five years and did not inflict any civilian causalities or any collateral damage that would affect the civilian population. However, it must also be taken into account that Iran maintained that their nuclear plants were entirely peaceful and only for the purpose of generating power.
Cyber Security is a complex issue. It evolves so fast that it is nearly impossible to keep up with. People have varying opinions on which policies are best, but it is so unpredictable that it is hard to say, maybe even often in retrospect, who was right and who was wrong. The best we can do is stay educated about the threats and preventative measures and make our best assessment on what we think will provide the most security.
