More proactive cybersecurity urged for US, allies

Offensive cyber operations below the threshold of armed conflict were noted by U.S. Cyber Command Senior Strategist Emily Goldman to have been strategically undermining the U.S. and its allies and partners as adversaries become emboldened to deploy routinary attacks without the risk of war, reports The Record, a news site by cybersecurity firm Recorded Future.

Such a development should prompt the adoption of more proactive cybersecurity measures, including hunt forward operations long advanced by the U.S., said Goldman, who previously led the National Security Agency and Cyber Command’s joint action group, at the International Conference on Cyber Conflict held in Estonia.

“I’m not suggesting that we should not respond to significant cyber incidents, but it has to be pursued in tandem with efforts to thwart that aggressor, below armed conflict, before it harms our nations. What we have to do is create a situation where adversaries cannot sustain that behavior. We don’t think we can eliminate all of it, what we want to try to do is disrupt that which is strategically consequential,” Goldman added.