Cyber is everywhere in our lives today and it is our greatest strategic weakness.

In 2015, the FBI and Department of Homeland Security determined Chinese sources, likely the Chinese Army, hacked the federal government’s Office of Personnel Management stealing 21.5 million applications for security clearances. Not only were vital statistics like social security number and credit history vacuumed up but, also, family relationships and social networks. Not even such a blatant and dangerous data security breach spurred the government beyond holding a couple of face saving Congressional hearings. —

Wikileaks disclosed information hacked from the CIA that exposed our ability to track terrorists through their cell phones. The result tipped off the terrorists who’ve returned to more primitive but harder to track methods of communication.

Global “ransom ware” attacks on hospitals have done little to prompt even a single Congressional hearing.

Equifax Credit Bureau was so careless with data they collect from all Americans involuntarily that hackers roamed undetected through their huge credit databases for nearly four months stealing the information of nearly half of the American people – using — what appears to be — a specific set of selection criteria. The government’s response: Consumers can sue Equifax.

The Security and Exchange Commission’s EDGAR System was hacked a year ago (August, 2016). It is likely that some person or persons or country unknown had access to the financial reporting data of every publically traded American or multi-national corporation before that information was made public, as required by law. Congress and the American people were not told until the appointment of a new SEC Chairman in September, 2017.

For almost a year, hackers were able to use (or sell)”insider trader information” to trade on specific stocks before the company’s public announcement of earnings. Such trading is a federal crime.

Just last week, the Department of Homeland Security released a list of 21 states where Russians successfully or semi-successfully hacked into state election systems prior to the 2016 Presidential election.

Taken together these are hostile acts against the nation and the people of the United States – as surely as if those bits and bytes were bullets.

In this war of bits, bytes, and the dark web, there is no “frontline” and Congress is not doing its job: Building an army to protect you and I – the American people – from a nefarious global network of economic terrorists.

No American is Safe:

Almost every aspect of daily American life is connected to the World Wide Web.

When you:

• Apply for a job
• Apply for a mortgage or rental approval
• Watch television
• Shop – online and off
• Buy groceries at the local grocery store
• Dial 911 an emergency
• Catch up with friends
• Make a medical appointment
• Pay the basic monthly bills
• Save for retirement etc.

The details of every transaction are collected by numerous public and private interests – irrespective of your Constitutional right to privacy. Under the best of circumstances, this data is summarized and sold to better “target” you as a customer.

In the hands of a criminal this data can be used to steal your identity. It can be used to blackmail you into – for example — spying against your employer, your neighbors or friends. It might allow a health insurance company illegal access to your genetic profile.

Protect Our National Infrastructure

There is no part of the infrastructure that we all depend on that does not, also, depend on technology:

• Weather forecasting
• Water storage and transport
• Power generation and transport
• Farming
• Air travel
• Rail travel
• Ocean and river craft
• Your family car
• Corner gas station
• Hospitals
• Police Stations
• Jails
• Military Installations and Military Hardware etc.

It is not classified information that our government, private and public utilities and other quasi-government agencies have acknowledged their vulnerability to cyber attack.

Stop for a moment and think what the consequences would be if, for example, your electric utility provider were held for ransom by a hostile government or non-state-actor. Denied electric power, many activities we take for granted would quickly stop. What would the social consequences be if gasoline pumps stopped pumping, grocery stores couldn’t refrigerate or even checkout your groceries, ATMs could not dispense cash, and credit card transactions could not be verified across a wide section of America.

Every automaker and others including Apple and Google are working on the “inevitable” driverless car — navigation via the Internet. WHAT IF a terrorist or state actor hacked into the driverless car fleet and turned our interstate highways into real-time bumper cars?

CYBER WARFARE IS NOT STAR WARS

Several states have started to regulate autonomous vehicles, remote home security and other technologies that could put Americans at risk. Not so Congress.

Congress is worried about other things: for example, to build or not to build a wall on our southern border.

Daily reports of massive data breaches, repeated theft of Americans personal data by criminals and hostile state actors, over several years, haven’t prompted Congress or the President – past or present – to take the necessary steps to protect every day Americans from this new and potent threat.

Congress and state governments have been repeatedly briefed on the vulnerabilities of our power grid and communication systems to cyber attack. But none of those briefings have moved Congress to debate or legislate additional cyber security measures outside the reactive Homeland Security Department’s Computer Emergency Reaction Term.

It is well past time that Congress acts pro-actively to establish a cabinet level CYBER SECURITY Department to coordinate all military, intelligence, law enforcement and private sector cyber security initiatives.

Every American has a right to expect Congress to take all steps necessary to protect the life, liberty, privacy and security of every citizen.

As much as we expect our military to be one step ahead of our potential enemies – so must our cyber sleuths.

Graphic courtesy of us.123rf.com