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Cyber Risk Wednesday: Rethinking Commercial Espionage

1,347 views · Published 29 July 2015 · 1:15:46 · Indexed 29 October 2026

Channel: AtlanticCouncil · 2015 · Nonprofits & Activism

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Cyber Risk Wednesday: Rethinking Commercial Espionage

Join the Atlantic Council's Cyber Statecraft Initiative on July 29 from 4:00 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. for a discussion on new ideas on commercial cyber espionage and intellectual property theft.

The United States is nearly alone in professing that states should not spy for the private sector's commercial benefit. As Gen. Michael Hayden (Ret.), former Director of National Security Agency and the Central Intelligence Agency, puts it: "I've conducted espionage. I went after state secrets and I actually think we're pretty good at it. Where I object is where you have state power being used against private enterprise for commercial purposes." Instead, the United States has strongly promoted innovation and intellectual property, publicly berating or punishing countries that engage in the systematic theft of technology, trade secrets, and proprietary information.

However, as indictments and advances in cyber defense have proven insufficient to secure commercial secrets, it is now time to consider alternative policy options to defend the private sector. Perhaps to save the principles behind banning commercial espionage, we must first embrace it. Could the United States reach better economic and national security outcomes if it joined its adversaries in spying for profit? Could like-minded nations create bilateral no-spy agreements, slowly expanding these into a global institution? Or would experimenting with economic espionage erode the West's credibility and moral high-ground, leaving us worse off than before?

The panelists will debate whether the United States should continue to abstain from economic espionage, or whether these challenges demand innovative, even radical solutions.

Follow the conversation on Twitter at @AtlanticCouncil using #ACCyber.

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