From the president to the mainstream media, all of a sudden it seems state-sponsored hacking is a problem
Whether you believe Barack Obama’s presidency was a failure or a success, there is no doubt on the subject of cybercrime, this administration not only failed to bring state-sponsored hackers to justice, they rewarded the people who directed them with hundreds of millions of dollars in cash.
The U.S. knew the Iranian government hacked American financial institutions as well as public infrastructure which could have killed Americans. As a result, Attorney General Loretta Lynch indicted seven Iranians for doing the hacking.
The U.S. then gave $1.7 billion dollars to the country. Yes, the argument can be made that the money was owed to Teheran. This doesn’t mean the U.S. had to pay it.
If the U.S. wanted to send a message to global cyberhackers, all it had to do was to ask for the seven indicted hackers in exchange for the money.
This isn’t such a difficult idea. If your country hacks the U.S. and you then fork over just under 2 billion dollars, you obviously couldn’t care less about your nation’s cybersecurity.
This was mentioned by none other than me in August. Did anyone care about state-sponsored hacking at the time? Absolutely not.
Look at what I said:
One wishes something as crucial as this got the media coverage it deserves but instead, the top political news of the day and I kid you not is Donald Trump choosing an advisory team with no women, Donald Trump is Crazy as well as other crucial news like Donald Trump’s Campaign Website Won’t Let You Cancel Recurring Donations and of course What Happened After I Wrote That Cargo Shorts Story.
Bottom line, it’s very difficult to identify foreign hackers. Let alone seven of them. The U.S. had a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get these criminals and bring them to justice. Instead, we gave the country-of-hacker-origin almost two billions dollars! And we didn’t get one hacker in exchange – not even one!
If the current administration really felt state-sponsored hacking was a priority, the time to address it has come and gone.
