By Franz-Stefan Gady
Washington appears to be serious about upholding the distinction between commercial versus traditional cyber espionage.
The Obama administration had decided against publicly “naming and shaming” Chinese hackers despite convincing evidence that Beijing is behind cyberattacks on the networks of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) that compromised personal information of more than 4 million former and current federal employees, theWashington Post’s Ellen Nakashima reports.
While one senior administration official in an interview with Nakashima argued that this is partially due to a reluctance to reveal the United States’ own cyberespionage capabilities by making public what they know, the more interesting justification might be found on the cyber diplomacy front and Washington’s attempt to shape norms or rules of the road in cyberspace–in particular the United States’ quest to draw a distinction between commercial versus traditional cyber espionage. According to Nakashima:
The response to penetrations targeting government-held data has been more restrained, in part because U.S. officials regard such breaches as within the traditional parameters of espionage. Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. and others have even expressed grudging admiration for the OPM hack, saying U.S. spy agencies would do the same against other governments.
Economic espionage occupies a separate category — supposedly off-limits to U.S. spy agencies and seen as deserving of a forceful response when committed by foreign adversaries.
Read the full story at The Diplomat