Let the cybersecurity debate begin

[Commentary] The July 25 editorial “Slipping through the ’Net,” regarding the desirability of public debate regarding offensive cyberforces, argued, “We had a decades-long debate about nuclear weapons, and it was healthy for the country and the world.” Cyberweapons are not at all like nuclear weapons, but the lesson is the same. The 2009 National Research Council report (of which I was an editor) that was cited in the editorial recommended that the United States conduct a broad, unclassified national debate about cyberattack policy. It also stated that the U.S. government should work to find common ground with other nations regarding cyberattack on such subjects as how the laws of war and the U.N. charter apply to cyberattack, the significance of nonstate parties that might launch cyberattacks and how nations should respond to such attacks. Both of these recommendations remain still valid.

[Lin is chief scientist for the National Research Council’s Computer Science and Telecommunications Board.]