Episode 343 of the Cyberlaw Podcast is a long meditation on the ways in which technology is encouraging other nations to exercise soft power inside the United States. I interview Nina Jankowicz, author of How to Lose the Information War on how Russian disinformation has affected Poland, Ukraine, and the rest of Eastern
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Steptoe Cyberlaw Podcast – Interview with Melanie Teplinsky
If there really is another crypto war in Washington, then this week’s podcast features several war correspondents and at least one victim of PTSD. Our guest is Melanie Teplinsky, former cybersecurity lawyer at Steptoe, adjunct professor at American University’s Washington College of Law, advisory board member for Crowdstrike, and a regular columnist on privacy…
Steptoe Cyberlaw Podcast – Interview with John Lynch
Back for a rematch, John Lynch and I return to the “hackback” debate in episode 97, with Jim Lewis of CSIS providing color commentary. John Lynch is the head of the Justice Department’s computer crime section. We find more common ground than might be expected but plenty of conflict as well. I suggest that Sheriff Arpaio in Arizona may soon be dressing hackers in pink while deputizing backhackers, while Jim Lewis focuses on the risk of adverse foreign government reactions. We also consider when it’s lawful to use “web beacons” and whether trusted security professionals should be given more leeway to take action outside their customers’ networks. In response to suggestions that those who break into hacker hop points might be sued by the third parties who nominally own those hop points, I suggest that those parties could face counterclaims for negligence. We close with a surprisingly undogmatic discussion of Justice Department “no-action letters” for computer security practitioners considering novel forms of active defense.
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Steptoe Cyberlaw Podcast – Interview with Senator Tom Cotton
How do you graduate as a conservative with two Harvard degrees? We learn this and much more from Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR), our guest for episode 96 . We dive deep with the Senator on the 215 metadata program and its USA FREEDOM Act replacement. We ask what the future holds for the 702 program, one of the most important counterterrorism programs and just entering yet another round of jockeying over renewal; Sen. Cotton has already come out in favor of making the program permanent. To round things out, Sen. Cotton assesses the risks of Going Dark for our intelligence community and the difficulties that the Safe Harbor negotiations pose for US intelligence.
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Does Your CEO Know What’s Keeping You Up at Night?
Security Magazine’s Security Talk interviewed us on how we help clients navigate cybersecurity issues. In the article, “Does Your CEO Know What’s Keeping You Up at Night?,” we discuss how a company’s ability to weather a cyber attack depends in part on the decisions the company makes both before a breach occurs and…
Steptoe Cyberlaw Podcast – Interview with Annie Antón and Peter Swire
Episode 76 of the podcast features the power couple of privacy and cybersecurity, Peter Swire and Annie Antón, both professors at Georgia Institute of Technology. I question them on topics from the USA FREEDOM Act to the enduring gulf between writing law and writing code.
In the news roundup, as our listeners have come…
Steptoe Cyberlaw Podcast – Interview with Catherine Lotrionte
Our guest commentator for episode 74 is Catherine Lotrionte, a recognized expert on international cyberlaw and the associate director of the Institute for Law, Science and Global Security at Georgetown University. We dive deep on the United Nations Group of Government Experts, and the recent agreement of that group on a few basic norms…
Steptoe Cyberlaw Podcast – Interview with Robert Knake
Our guest for Episode 73 is Rob Knake, currently the Council on Foreign Relations Senior Fellow for Cyber Policy and formerly with DHS, the White House, and the Richard Clarke finishing school for cybersecurity policymakers. Rob and I are quickly embroiled in disagreement; as usual, I mock the cyberspace “norms” that Rob supports and…
Steptoe Cyberlaw Podcast – Interview with Dan Kaminsky
Our guest for Episode 70 of the Cyberlaw Podcast is Dan Kaminsky, a famous cybersecurity researcher who found and helped fix a DNS security flaw. Dan is now the Chief Scientist at WhiteOps, but I got to know him in an unlikely-bedfellows campaign against SOPA because of its impact on DNS security. Dan…
Steptoe Cyberlaw Podcast – Interview with Mary DeRosa
Our guest for episode 64 of the Cyberlaw Podcast is Mary DeRosa, the chief lawyer for the National Security Council during the early years of the Obama Administration, and now a Distinguished Visitor at Georgetown University Law Center. We ask Mary to walk us through a hypothetical set of NSC meetings on the Sony…