From: American Enterprise Institute
Jeffrey Eisenach, Claude Barfield, James K. Glassman, Mario Loyola, Shane Tews
Key Points
- The Internet is an American success story, generating tremendous benefits at home and globally, and helping to advance American values of freedom, security, and prosperity.
- It has also created challenges, among them its use by authoritarian states to repress political freedoms, by criminals to steal property and commit extortion, and by America’s adversaries and potential adversaries to use malicious code and cyber-warfare to threaten our economic and national security.
- The US needs a coherent and comprehensive strategy to address these and other challenges in order to defend and promote America’s national interests in an increasingly digital world.
- This report is premised on the belief that, while our present policies are well intended, they have not been sufficiently effective in achieving our key national objectives.
- This report puts forward the beginnings of such a strategy in the areas of Internet freedom and human rights, international trade and digital commerce, cybercrime and law enforcement, and critical infrastructure and cyber defense.
Executive Summary
Success in cyberspace is essential to advancing America’s national interests. Digital technologies determine how many of the processes that define modern societies operate, from communications to finance, electricity to transportation, espionage to national defense. The ability to control how these technologies are used in the present—and to influence the course of their development in the future—is a vital element of national power. This report puts forward a comprehensive strategy for ensuring that the Internet continues to promote America’s national interests by advancing its ideals—freedom, security, and prosperity.
The report begins from a recognition that, while the US invented and pioneered the Internet, today’s cyberspace is truly global. Fewer than 1 out of 10 of the world’s three billion Internet users live in the US, while nearly a quarter live in China. The global nature of cyberspace means that America cannot isolate itself from the global Internet nor expect to dictate unilaterally the policies and practices that govern its use and future development. However, it can and must use its influence and power to ensure the Internet remains a force for good in the world. To be successful, it needs to a comprehensive strategy.
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