CIO OPINION
Protecting our cyberinfrastructure is as important as protecting physical infrastructure .
Lior Div , CEO and Co-founder , Cybereason
How we respond today impacts our security tomorrow
Lior Div , CEO and Co-founder , Cybereason , asks how the US government should respond to the threat of persistent and highly damaging cyberattacks and considers what strategies should be deployed to reverse the adversary advantage .
In the past few months , we ’ ve faced massive attacks with SolarWinds and the HAFNIUM attacks targeting Microsoft Exchange , followed by the unprecedented ransomware attack by DarkSide that crippled US critical infrastructure . It is time to ask ourselves again , what is really going on ?
More importantly , the time has come for the United States government to do some soul searching on why defenses have failed and how we can prevent similar attacks in the future .
As a nation , we are pretty bad at detecting cyberthreats . We generally discover attacks long after the fact – after the damage has been done .
As bad as we are at detection , though , the US government and most organizations are even worse at response , and we do a generally poor job of learning and applying lessons to improve and prevent the next attack .
Thankfully , it seems that may be changing . President Biden has been clear that nation-state sponsored cyberattacks will not be tolerated under his administration , and that those nations responsible will be held accountable .
The United States can respond in a variety of ways : the Biden administration could expose Russian and Chinese intelligence assets , impose economic sanctions , issue warrants or subpoenas for Russian and Chinese nationals or agents suspected of being involved , expel Russian and Chinese diplomats from US soil , opt for a proportional military response if appropriate , or any combination of the above . With any available option also
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