Executive Summary
The interconnectedness and openness made possible by the Internet and the broader digital ecosystem create unparalleled value for society. The architects of the Internet could not know, however, that it would reach the breadth and scope seen today.
In 2018, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) declared that cyber weapons and sophisticated hacking pose a greater threat to the United States than the risk of physical attacks. With the U.S. economy losing between $57 billion and $109 billion per year to malicious cyber activity, it is clear that in order to remain secure and competitive, the United States needs a comprehensive national policy agenda in the cybersecurity space.
In recognition of the growing importance of cybersecurity to America’s economic and national security, the Council on Competitiveness in 2018 launched a three-dialogue series on increasing the resilience of the nation’s critical infrastructure, intellectual property and industrial operations against cyberattack. The series, co-chaired by Dr. Steven Ashby, director of Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Mr. George Fischer, senior vice president and group president of Verizon Enterprise Solutions, and Dr. Farnam Jahanian, president of Carnegie Mellon University, focused on the security and economic challenges posed by the increasing cyber threat and sought to identify mechanisms for building resilience in the new battlefield of digital warfare.
The cybersecurity initiative engaged more than 150 experts and consisted of three dialogues, each of which sought to identify the challenges and opportunities in distinct sectors of the economy. The first dialogue, hosted by Verizon in New Jersey in February 2018, examined the role of the private sector in U.S. critical infrastructure. The discussion made clear that despite the clear importance of cybersecurity in the current technological and political climate—and the threat cyber-attacks pose to critical infrastructure and intellectual property, and therefore to business operations and national security—resource constraints, both financial and human, are pervasive. Read our report, Cybersecurity for Industry: Ensuring Prosperity in a Digital Economy for more.
At the second dialogue, hosted by Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Seattle in April 2018, experts across multiple sectors gathered to assess and make recommendations on the state of cybersecurity as it relates to U.S. national security. The conversation called attention to the lack of coordination across various sectors and agencies, the need to incentivize best practices in security and the importance of leveraging local and regional assets to prepare and respond to cyber-attacks. Read our report, Cybersecurity: An Issue of National Security for more. The third and final dialogue in the series, hosted by Carnegie Mellon University in Washington, D.C., in June 2018, sought to engage federal policymakers from Capitol Hill and the administration in this important conversation and to develop an actionable agenda to improve U.S. resilience to cyber threats.
Together, the challenges, opportunities and recommendations discussed throughout the three cybersecurity dialogues—and throughout the EMCP’s six sector dialogues—formed the foundation for the Council’s National Agenda for Cybersecurity presented in this report.
The cybersecurity work was conducted under the umbrella of the Council’s Energy and Manufacturing Competitiveness Partnership (EMCP), a C-suite-directed initiative focused on the shifting global energy and manufacturing landscape and how energy transformation and demand are shaping industries essential to America’s prosperity and security. Critically, the EMCP approached America’s diverse industrial landscape not as a monolith but as a network of distinct but interdependent productive sectors, each with its own challenges and opportunities. The Council's call to action on energy and manufacturing can be found in our report released on October 15, 2018--Accelerate: Turbocharging the Manufacturing Renaissance in an Era of Energy Abundance.
Throughout the exploration of six critical sectors of the U.S. economy, it became clear that cybersecurity is a significant issue that cuts across all industries and sectors, and that the United States is in need of a coordinated strategy for addressing this growing challenge. The genesis of Council’s work in this space, however, dates back to long before the launch of the EMCP in 2015. Released in 2007, Transform. The Resilient Economy: Integrating Competitiveness and Security declared, “The challenge is not security; it is resilience.” The report promoted a strategy of resilience for both the public and private sectors—one that called for building America’s capability to survive, adapt, evolve and grow in the face of challenges. While the challenges may have changed in the last ten years, the link between competitiveness and security is stronger than ever.
The National Agenda for Cybersecurity has the power to secure and strengthen America’s resilience to the growing cyber threat while ensuring America remains a competitive, productive and prosperous nation.
Read the full report, Secure: Ensuring Resilience and Prosperity in a Digital Economy here.
Read the executive summary and recommendations from Secure here.
