Like you, we are passionate about this country, its hard-working people, its go-getter attitude, and its embrace of technology to drive efficiency and improve lives. Yet, we’ve also noticed a troubling trend. We’ve seen the continuous onslaught of cyberattacks, the resulting disruption and losses, and the very real impact it is having. We can’t stand by another day and let the national wealth of this country — meaning our ability to innovate, our ability to dream, and our ability to execute — be plundered by others to the tune of $600 Billion a year. As technology is now woven into the fabric of our societies and our economies, cybersecurity connects with national security, with economic security. We can’t afford to be distracted by politics, divisiveness, and other matters-of-the-moment and fail to recognize that cybersecurity is not only a big problem, it’s a huge problem. It’s a hideously expensive problem. And it is getting worse.
Which brings us to this message. It’s time for a National “Stop the IP Brain-Drain” Strategy. We call ourselves the Cyberavengers. We’ve been around for two years, sounding the alarm, sharing ideas and solutions, writing, speaking, helping. We want to help prevent the next Business Email Compromise (BEC), the next ransomware case. We have seen the “Thanos” of the cyber world (insert here any nation-state you want) launch attacks after attacks. He wants to snap his fingers again. But the Cyberavengers say “enough.” We all need to step up our game, for our country, our neighbors, our children. At $600 billion a year, can anyone truly say what will be left in 20 years, when our children have to take over this mess? As friends of ours say, this is not happening. This will not happen on my watch. Period.
Many have said to us, “we need a strategy.” The smart ones say, “we need an actionable strategy.” That is the correct view. We need a “whole of nation” approach. We break our strategy down into three bite sized pieces, people, process and technology. There are actionable items in each piece. Adopt one piece of the strategy. But please adopt more. The government part of our strategy will take some more work. But that needs to be accomplished too. As the only way we stop this Brain Drain is by a whole of nation approach.
Paul Ferrillo
Stop the IP Brain Drain – People
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Stop the IP Brain Drain – Processes
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Stop the IP Brain Drain – Technology
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Our Stop the IP Brain Drain Plan
Did we fail to mention one piece of technology? Most likely, and if you feel strongly about it, give us your suggestions, your ideas, but be ready to show that the tool you’re supporting is truly effective.
We needed to have an actionable strategy. Here is one. None of its pieces are out of play in today’s target rich environment. Our plan is not perfect. But given we are losing $600 billion a year to IP theft, we should not let perfect get in the way of good. Imagine using our plan and lowering this amount to $300 billion next year, $100 billion in two years. You get the point. Imagine the good we could do in this country with that money?