Based on the rules Russia has proposed that oppose the Budapest Convention, the United States should continue to support the international collaboration within the Budapest Convention. The United States currently is involved in maintaining the balance between upholding its own cybersecurity laws and helping other countries uphold theirs. By keeping the Budapest Convention in place, the United States would continue to enforce its cybersecurity laws, which are necessary as it is one of the countries most affected by cybercrime (Peters). Maintaining these laws would also take away power from Russia and China, as they would allow continued access to international networks for monitoring and criminal activity tracking purposes. Russia and China both want to take more domestic control over Internet access by censoring and cutting off access to their Internet, and such policies threaten U.S. national security (Morgan, Ayres).
Based on the benefits of the Budapest Convention to national intelligence and security, the United States should continue negotiating with Russia over maintaining an international channel for cybercrime. By being involved in international cybercrime – regardless of legality domestically – the United States can monitor for terrorist threats and other activity harmful to its security (Anderson). The United States must make efforts to keep collaboration and goodwill between the countries of the United Nations by making joint efforts in cybercrime around the world. This collaboration would be beneficial in defending all involved countries from cyberattacks. Even Russia, who opposes having an open border with their Internet, could use more help against cyberterrorism with their recent 1500 percent increase in cybercrime (PONARS). Their efforts with BI.ZONE, a Russian bank-backed cybersecurity company, could be augmented and supported by international aid (TechRadar).
The current Budapest Convention allows the United States to gather intelligence from other countries, which supports U.S. national security. In recent times, internet sources have dominated intelligence. The NSA’s new Integrated Cyber Center houses up to 1,400 personnel on teams dedicated to foreign intelligence and cyber defense (Konkel). If the avenues for these people to do their job were closed, U.S. security and its help to other countries would be greatly hindered. For example, the United States was able to able to track down ISIS partly using internet-derived intelligence (Temple-Raston). Such intelligence collection efforts could support security during the U.S. 2020 elections. Without being able to see where potential election hacking could be coming from, the United States could face similar accusations in regards to election results as during the previous presidential cycle (Lindsey). The U.S. Army is going to employ a proactive engagement in fighting cybercrime during the election. This will not be possible if Russia’s proposed changes to international cyber rules go into force.
In order for the United States to continue to monitor threats and to keep goodwill with international allies, it must oppose the addendums suggested by Russia to the Budapest Convention. The suggested changes would hinder threat monitoring efforts and collaborations with other countries. The hinderances would eventually negatively affect how the United States is able to help other countries and keep its networks secure.
Works Cited
Anderson, Nate. “‘World’s Worst Internet Law’ Ratified by Senate.” Ars Technica, August 4, 2006. https://arstechnica.com/uncategorized/2006/08/7421/.
Ayres, Sabra. “Russia Wants to Unplug Its Internet from the Rest of the World. Is That Even Possible?” Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, March 4, 2019. https://www.latimes.com/world/europe/la-fg-russia-internet-20190304-story.html.
Konkel, Frank. “Inside the NSA’s New Cybersecurity Directorate.” Nextgov.com. Nextgov, October 11, 2019. https://www.nextgov.com/cybersecurity/2019/10/inside-nsas-new-cybersecurity-directorate/160566/.
Lindsey, Nicole. “US Cyber Command Signals More Aggressive Approach Involving Persistent Engagement Ahead of 2020 Election.” CPO Magazine, September 12, 2019. https://www.cpomagazine.com/cyber-security/us-cyber-command-signals-more-aggressive-approach-involving-persistent-engagement-ahead-of-2020-election/.
Morgan, Nicholas. “Russia’s Cyber Attacks Blindspot and Preventive Measures: GRI.” Global Risk Insights, March 26, 2019. https://globalriskinsights.com/2019/03/russia-cyber-attacks-blindspot/.
Peters, Allison. “Russia and China Are Trying to Set the U.N.’s Rules on Cybercrime.” Foreign Policy. Foreign Policy, September 16, 2019.
Sukharenko, Alexander. “Russian ITC Security Policy and Cybercrime.” PonarsEuarasia – Policy Memos, July 17, 2019.
TechRadar Pro. “An inside Look at Russia’s Cybersecurity Market: a Q&A with BI.ZONE.” TechRadar. TechRadar pro, September 24, 2019. https://www.techradar.com/news/an-inside-look-at-russias-cybersecurity-market-a-qanda-with-bizone.
Temple-Raston, Dina. “How The U.S. Hacked ISIS.” NPR. NPR, September 26, 2019. https://www.npr.org/2019/09/26/763545811/how-the-u-s-hacked-isis.