US Cyber Policy: Defending Openness
Two 2018 US federal government documents reaffirm the US goal in cyberspace as defending openness, indicating a remarkable consistency in cyber policy across multiple administrations. This continuity has allowed strategy to evolve to a constructive point so the United States can better shore up vulnerabilities in the cyber domain. The congruence between policy and strategy leaves the United States on an ideological standing in cyberspace where that nation enjoys a permanent, asymmetrical, strategic advantage. Keeping that position is an obvious mandate now and in the future.
A series of documents present this policy of advancing openness and span the Obama White House, the Department of Defense, the Department of State, and come to the present with the National Cyber Strategy (NCS) and the DOD Cyber Strategy (DCS), both released in 2018.
The NCS looks to ensure a free flow of data across political borders, a means of validating the longstanding American “vison for an open, interoperable, reliable, and secure Internet” (1). This connectivity advances American values of “universal aspirations of free expression and individual liberty around the world” (1).
When the Trump administration released an Executive Order on May 11, 2017, seeking to increase protections of the nation’s federal networks and infrastructure, that document repeated that refrain:
"…it is the policy of the executive branch to promote an open, interoperable, reliable, and secure
internet that fosters efficiency, innovation, communication, and economic prosperity, while
respecting privacy and guarding against disruption, fraud, and theft." [Sec. 3 (a)]
This mandate first appeared in the “International Strategy for Cyberspace,” a White House document dated 2011, that states that the goal of the United States is to preserve the open Internet because it delivers US values globally, and by implication democratizes all those that come into contact with the medium. This ideological, strategic advantage threatens all those who decry and reject western norms of governance and rule of law. The Preamble makes clear that US strategy is designed to confront threats in that space but adhere to the “principles we hold dear: free speech and association, privacy, and the free flow of information.” This mission has a global reach since the digital world is “one of the finest examples of a community self-organizing, as civil society, academia, the private sector, and governments work together democratically to ensure its effective management.” This vision of cyberspace makes the ideological premise clear: “Most important of all, this space continues to grow, develop, and promote prosperity, security, and openness as it has since its invention.”
The DOD embraces this policy as well as seen in the first sentence of the DCS 2018 that reads: “American prosperity, liberty, and security depend upon open and reliable access to information,” access that comes via the Internet (1). The document then notes that US adversaries look to cyberspace to challenge US global ascendancy. The US military must be prepared to utilize cyberspace to meet this challenge without impinging on openness.
The DOD embraced this policy in 2015 in the “Department of Defense Cyber Strategy, 2015”:
"The United States is committed to an open, secure, interoperable, and reliable Internet that enables
prosperity, public safety, and the free flow of commerce and ideas. These qualities of the Internet reflect
core American values – of freedom of expression and privacy, creativity, opportunity, and innovation (1)."
The DOD made a similar statement back in 2011. In its “Department of Defense Strategy for Operating in Cyberspace,” the DOD declared the country must “mitigate risk posed to US and allied cyberspace capabilities, while protecting and respecting the principles of privacy and civil liberties, free expression, and innovation that have made cyberspace an integral part of US prosperity and security” (1).
There is much more here. The Department of State released the “International Cyberspace Policy Strategy” in March 2016 that also embraces openness as policy (1). The Department of Homeland Security, after numerous delays, finally delivered a cyber security document in May 2018 titled, “Cybersecurity Strategy,” and repeated the familiar refrain of defending openness (4).
Grandiose but in line with American sensibilities since the nation’s founding, openness marks a clear consistency in policy, one widely shared by many stakeholders, and one based on a sound assessment of Internet realities.
Openness is a key US advantage best suited to waging the ideological war in cyberspace that is already afoot and so greatly troubles those nations favoring a closed and restricted cyberspace. US cyber policy to secure that very element – a permanent, asymmetrical, strategic advantage in cyberspace - allays much of the concern that porous cyber borders work against US interests.
How best to curb threats arising from that position emphasizes the renewed effort of the federal government to achieve already stated goals. The NCS captures this maturing strategy in a number of ways. The federal government will continue to get its own house in order with more oversight across government departments of contractors, of the supply chain, and in the prosecution of criminal cyber activity. Government efforts to protect intellectual property and aid the development of an improving cyber workforce via educational initiatives will not intrude on the private sector, the means driving the digital innovation making the United States the world-leader in this field. The United States will partner with like-minded nations to advance cyber governance norms so no one power can dominate the domain.
These initiatives reflect the longstanding American strategy in cyberspace and reveal a maturation process slowly finding balance between needs, innovation, and threats. The consistency in advancing the Obama strategic vision for cyberspace reflects a wise unwillingness to clamp down on openness to get more secure, a step, if taken, is one that basically concedes the American way of life as a critical vulnerability rather than a strength that threatens opponents of openness far more than connectivity threatens US citizens at home. Openness advancing values as the key to US cyber policy stands ready to serve the United States well.
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