Politics will be dominating current events in 2016 in the United States, building up to the Presidential election in November. Given the Presidential primaries coming up soon, almost everything – including security – is being seen through a political prism. With the recent San Bernardino attacks, the focus has once again shifted to protection of citizens against terrorist attacks. Government surveillance, such as monitoring of suspected terrorists or individuals has always been a contentious issue.
Reactions to San Bernardino attacks
Security has been an especially hot topic in U.S. politics since the December 2nd attack in San Bernardino, California. In the days and weeks since the husband-and-wife terrorists killed 14 people (and seriously injured 22 others) at a government facility about 60 miles east of Los Angeles, the shooters’ history as terrorists and supporters of ISIS have made headlines here.
Donald Trump, front-runner for the Republican nomination, grabbed the momentum of the public conversation right after the story broke by announcing he would ban all Muslims from entering the United States until “we can figure out what’s going on.” Many saw the proposal as silly (not to mention unconstitutional), but it was an accurate reflection of the public’s fear and frustration on hearing, for example, that the wife of the terrorist couple entered the United States on a fiancée visa despite her extremist views and questionable history.
Trump’s proposal shows how easily fear can turn into racism. Attributing the terrorism perpetrated by an extreme subset to a larger group is bad enough. Even worse is seeking to restrict that larger group from entering the country, and more thoughtful commentators quickly compared Trump’s proposal to our country’s shameful treatment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
Understanding actionable intelligence
Even so, Trump’s comments resonated among many in a fearful populace looking for effective (even if extreme) answers to a seemingly intractable problem.
"We are not talking about isolation,” said Trump in a debate among Republican primary candidates on December 15th. “We're talking about security. We're not talking about religion, we're talking about security."
Security (specifically national security) provided a lot of talking points for the nine candidates at the televised debate.
The question of government surveillance and its role in fighting terrorism caused a clash between candidates Marco Rubio of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas, both Senators. Rubio slammed Cruz for supporting the USA Freedom Act, which extended some Patriot Act provisions but not the ability to collect and keep bulk data. "We have to get rid of all this PC stuff and people are worried somebody is going to say that I'm Islamophobic or what have you," Rubio said. "This is craziness because we are at war.”
A familiar term in our market, “actionable intelligence,” was mentioned during the debate, by New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, another candidate. Specifically, he said the next president should “understand what actionable intelligence looks like and act on it.” We hear that term often in our market as a description of the information that security professionals need from their systems. It’s an often elusive result, and I’m sure it’s even more so at the global level when fighting terrorists.
Encrypted communications
More haunting than discussions of terror is its reality, felt profoundly in San Bernardino. One factor that kept the San Bernardino couple off the radar was that they communicated using a mobile direct messaging app with end-to-end encryption. The communication, therefore, did not appear on any systems that monitor social media such as Twitter.
"If [ISIS] finds somebody online who … might be willing to travel or kill in place, they will begin a Twitter direct messaging contact," explains FBI Director James Comey, "If they really think that this is someone who will kill on their behalf, they move them from Twitter direct messaging, which we can get access to with lawful process, to a mobile messaging app that is encrypted. And at that moment the needle we have been searching to find in a nationwide haystack goes invisible to us."
Clearly, talking about the problem is easy, but solving it – not so much. Specific solutions are complex, often nuanced, and need more than the “bull in the China shop” approach displayed so far in the rhetoric this political season.