The National Guard Answers the Call for Cybersecurity at the State and Local Level
Author: Jean-Paul Laurenceau
Publisher:
Published: 2021
Total Pages: 25
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOK"The United States is witnessing a rise in cyber-attacks against local and federal governments. The US has not been completely successful in defending against the threats these attacks pose against its national interest. The government has been careful not to overreach into the private sector but there is a major gap that leave Americans fending to protect themselves and it is worse in the public sector. We have seen legislative fights over cyber bills leaving some with a feeling that the partisan battles have left America exposed to the growing variety of cyber threats. Many of the bills have had bipartisan support as well as bipartisan opposition. The fight is not over a need for appropriate cyber legislation; the fight is over how to define “appropriate.” The US faces threats from nation-state hackers like Russia, China, North Korea, and many more. The US identified Russia for its efforts in attacking our democracy when it hacked the Democratic National Committee leading to the 2016 Presidential Elections, and attempts by more nefarious actors to attempt to do same in the 2020 elections. China, with its ambitious desire to grow its economy, for years has been complicit in the theft of US commercial intellectual property. They have also been linked to the data breach at the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) that resulted in the compromise of at least 20 million federal employees. While the Obama administration has taken steps to improve the overall security of the nation’s network, the Trump Administration released the most proactive National Cyber Strategy (NCS) in 2018. The Department of Defense (DoD) followed suit and developed its own cybersecurity strategy that fully supports the NCS. Since taking office in January 2021, President Biden is taking the charge forward. His administration created and filled a new position, Deputy National Security Adviser for cyber and emerging technology. While the NCS and DoD cyber strategy are a good start to addressing cybersecurity, they do not do enough to support state and federal government agencies as their mandate dictates. The “defend forward” strategy is effective (and necessary), but it assumes that we have an infrastructure in place to “defend here”. The levels of attack that the US has and continues to experience says otherwise. The DoD is responsible for providing the military forces needed to deter war and protect the security of our country, this includes protection against cyber-attacks. For this reason, we need to establish a cybersecurity team within the Army National Guard (ARNG) in each state to assist with deterrence, denial, and remediation of cyber-attacks at the State and local level. The ARNG is community-based and reports to the governor of its respective state unless called to protect U.S. domestic interests in times of conflict or natural disaster. After discussing why cybersecurity is important, reviewing the federal cyber strategies, and looking at past cyber-attacks against state and government agencies, this paper will look at the role of the ARNG in support of the states. Based on these findings, the paper will conclude with a discussion for using the ARNG to provide cybersecurity support to the state and local government."--Abstract.