As cyber connectivity increases, foreign actors have been able to exploit vulnerabilities on smartphones, computers, and the digital infrastructure that supports them to undermine democracies. Probing and penetrating computer networks and connected systems allows malign actors to surreptitiously steal, alter, and collect data, damaging citizens’ privacy and disrupting organizational and institutional processes in democracies. Find ASD’s work on cybersecurity on this page.
Lindsay Gorman and Amber Frankland in Just Security: It’s Time for Congress to Push Companies to Come Forward on Hacks
Russia and China have the United States reeling from two devastating cyberattacks in under six months. The mammoth SolarWinds breach—attributed to Russia and affecting at least nine U.S. government agencies, 100 private companies, and further victim [...]
Kristine Berzina Discusses the Colonial Pipeline Cyberattack on Latvian Public Radio
Senior Fellow Kristine Berzina spoke on Latvian Radio's weekly foreign policy news show about the Colonial Pipeline cyberattack, how it is different from the fuel shortages caused by conflicts in the Middle East in the 1970s, and whether something s [...]
How to Structure a Foreign Malign Influence Center
On Monday, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) confirmed to Politico that it is working to establish a Foreign Malign Influence Center. The center, which was first authorized as part of the 2020 Defense Authorization bill, wil [...]
Lindsay Gorman Discusses Technology Cooperation with China at Berkeley’s Tech, Trade, and China Conference
Emerging Technologies Fellow Lindsay Gorman joined the Berkeley Center for Law & Technology’s third annual Tech, Trade, and China conference, where she discussed export controls and technology cooperation with China. [...]
Lindsay Gorman Interviews April Falcon Doss on ‘Cyber Privacy’
Emerging Technologies Fellow Lindsay Gorman interviewed April Falcon Doss, a privacy expert and former NSA and Senate lawyer, on her new book Cyber Privacy: Who Has Your Data and Why You Should Care at the Annapolis Book Festival. powered by Crowdca [...]
Defending 2020: What Worked, What Didn’t, and What’s Next
Executive Summary The 2016 presidential election served as a wakeup call to the threat of authoritarian interference, and in the years since, many segments of American society—from the federal government to private companies and civil society gro [...]
Here and Now: Chinese Interference in the Transatlantic Space
For several years, the Alliance for Securing Democracy (ASD) has been monitoring and cataloging instances of authoritarian interference in the transatlantic space. In 2018, ASD launched the Authoritarian Interference Tracker, an online database that [...]
Hamilton Toplines: December 12-18, 2020
Russian state media and diplomats sought to characterize the attribution of the SolarWinds hack that affected multiple U.S. government agencies and private sectors companies to Russia as part of the tradition of the United States blaming Russia for [...]
Three Takeaways for Defending Against Foreign Interference from the SolarWinds Hacks
On December 17, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) released a statement warning that a sophisticated and ongoing cyber breach posed a “grave risk” to government, critical infrastructure, and private sector organizations. Off [...]
Zack Cooper and Laura Rosenberger in Foreign Affairs: Democratic Values Are a Competitive Advantage
The contest with authoritarianism requires the United States to understand its strengths. Upon winning the presidency, Joe Biden promised to lead “not by the example of our power, but by the power of our example.” That pledge is important, because [...]
ASD Event Summary: Linking Values and Strategy: How Democracies Can Outcompete Autocracies
On December 10, the Alliance for Securing Democracy hosted a virtual event with Ambassador Eric Edelman, Ambassador Samantha Power, and Dr. Kori Schake on steps the United States can take to regain the initiative in the emerging competition with aut [...]
Lindsay Gorman on Cyber Command’s Success in the 2020 Election in Defense One
As the final high-tension hours of voting ticked away on Tuesday, nervous reporters waiting for news of foreign information warfare efforts were left like Vladimir and Estragon by the roadside, waiting for a phantom that never appeared. Instead came [...]