New Europe quotes Brent Scowcroft Center Assistant Director Klara Tothova Jordan on calls for NATO to do more about cyber threats:
In 2010, the state of play had been framed well by United States Deputy Secretary for Defense William Lynn, who was quoted as saying that “NATO has a nuclear shield, it is building a stronger and stronger defence shield, it needs a cyber shield as well”. Since then, the alliance has conducted several major cyber defence exercises and on an increasing scale. Cyber Coalition 2013, the sixth in the series, involved participants from five non-NATO countries (Austria, Finland, Ireland, Sweden and Switzerland) and as observers, New Zealand and the European Union (EU). The aim of the exercise was “to train technical personnel and their leadership and to test the ability of Allies and partners to coordinate and cooperate in their actions in warding off multiple simulated cyber attacks”. Just this month, an American analyst, Klara Tothova Jordan, advocated a shift by NATO away from its current limited and defensive approach. She argued that NATO must “provide operational capabilities to defend itself and its allies by collective preemptive and retaliatory actions.” She called for the sharing of offensive cyber capabilities and best practices and a clear commitment to recognize “deadly and destructive cyber attacks” on one member of the alliance as an attack on all that would justify an alliance response.