Bipartisan HACT Act couldn’t come at a better time

Originally published by Newsweek

A decade ago, a motivated hacker could make off with some of your most important documents—deeds, legal paperwork, tax returns or maybe that novel you’d been working on. He’d have a good idea of the basics, the most prosaic details.

Today, though, as the content of our digital lives creaks into gigabytes, heavy with tens of thousands of photos, logs of website visits and text messages, the same hacker could piece together your life in minute detail. Your secrets, hopes, fears and dreams are there, in your email account or on your phone, for the taking.

Any of us would be alarmed if some of our most sensitive conversations leaked to the public, our employers or other people we know. But what if even that information was spun, taken out-of-context or manipulated? This is an under-appreciated threat that, in the age of “deep fakes,” will only get more acute. Plus, while we’re all vulnerable to cyberattack and hacking from digital pirates who want to make a buck, or even from disgruntled family or employees, the incredible resources a hostile foreign state could bring to such an effort is even more terrifying.

The U.S. government is making an effort to combat this, but is concentrating on the biggest offenders first. This summer, the Justice Department announced a much-needed crackdown on Chinese cyberattacks and intellectual property theft, especially those targeting academic research institutions. Despite a long-time, widespread awareness of these espionage efforts against Americans, this is welcome news.

The Justice Department’s 2018 “China Initiative” rightly prioritizes cases of economic espionage from the Chinese Communist Party and has, thus far, announced charges in more than 20 egregious cases. But the Justice Department can’t be everywhere, and their lawyers have limited bandwidth to deal with cases that don’t pose an immediate, material threat to national security.