The Landscape of Cyber-security

This document is an attempt to describe the landscape of cyber-security. It starts from a specific framing–why the technology associated with cyberspace is insecure. The central conclusion is that improving the security posture of the technology is not itself a simple technical problem, but requires an understanding of economic issues, incentives and externalities, coordination and leadership, and issues of trust and (un)trustworthy actors. This framing should in turn be considered in a larger framing that considers how the limits to cybersecurity influence larger issues of national security, innovation, competitive advantage, return on investment, limits on the utility of cyber-technology, the global character of discourse and interaction and the like. Determining which of these larger issues are materially linked to the degree of security in cyber-space will in turn provide a motivation for what technical aspects of cyber-security warrant a focus of attention.