Begin forwarded message:
From: Stewart Baker <stewart.baker@gmail.com>
Date: June 13, 2009 10:26:21 PM EDT
To: dave@farber.net
Subject: Re: [IP] Cyberwar - Privacy May Be a Victim in Cyberdefense Plan - Series - NYTimes.com
The Washington Post decides that the new cyber-command is mainly interesting because it is an opportunity to raise privacy concerns. Here's the lead:
We're actually closer to 1984 than most people realize. Antidemocratic forces have the ability to turn on cameras in our homes and offices -- to monitor our every action and every keystroke. That's the lesson of the ghostnet report. http://www.scribd.com/doc/13731776/Tracking-GhostNet-Investigating-a-Cyber-Espionage-Network
The Pentagon's development of a "cyber-command" is prompting questions
about its role in the larger national strategy to protect government
and private-sector computer networks and whether privacy can be
protected. And the command is fueling debate over the proper rules to
govern a new kind of warfare in which unannounced adversaries using
bits of computer code can launch transnational attacks.
But you won't find any sign of that problem in today's story.
That's because the 1984ish powers aren't being exercised by the US government or NSA. And apparently there's no room in the Post for a story that doesn't make the US and NSA the chief privacy villains.
--
Stewart Baker
202-641-8670