Cyber-Attacks Against Westinghouse, Lockheed Martin, And US

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The cyber-attacks against Westinghouse, Lockheed Martin, and U.S. Steel have multiple common factors. All three attacks were initiated through phishing emails, were attributed to China, resulted in information theft, and caused significant financial damage. The information gained from Westinghouse allowed the Chinese to advance their nuclear plant development, saving them years in research. In the case of Lockheed Martin, China successfully used the information to advance their own air fighter capability, demonstrated by the J-20 fighter jet (Gertz, 2014). The U.S. Steel attacked also enabled China to become an industry competitor without spending time and resources in the development phase. It is a cultural norm and accepted behavior for …show more content…

Requirements and Liabilities
Although these victim organizations support the government and manufacture products deemed part of the U.S.’s critical infrastructure, they do not fall directly under government control. The Cybersecurity Act of 2015 encourages information sharing (Congress, 2015); however, it is not a forcing mechanism. The government has struggled to enact cybersecurity related regulations in the past due to entities, such as the Chamber of Commerce, “condemning it as excessive government interference in the free market…” (Dilanian, 2012)
The loss of intellectual property due to the phishing attacks is the obvious damage. However, there are additional damages that are incurred; damage to the company’s reputation, opportunity costs, cost of increasing cybersecurity, financial loss, employment losses, and risk to national security (McAfee, 2013). In the case of U.S. Steel, there was a loss of business caused by cheaper competition and a reported 30% decrease in sales (Miller, 2016). “Losses to the U.S. may reach $100 billion annually.” (McAfee, 2013) In the case of national security it is hard to assess the monetary damage. For example, the Chinese developing the J-20 fighter based on the stolen F-35 information. This not only allows them to spend less resources on research and development; it saves them time, allowing them to be better postured for kinetic conflict. Most significantly, it prevents the U.S. government from being able to use the F-35 against China, and potentially its allies, in any future conflict as they know the capabilities and can develop

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