Cookies, Privacy, and Cyber Security: Legal and Policy Analysis

This report discusses the importance of cybersecurity in the United States, particularly in the context of globalization and the rise of cybercrime. It highlights the significant losses faced by the government and citizens due to cyberattacks, referencing the high number of cases in 2016. The report defines cyberattacks, emphasizing the need for companies and individuals to protect their data. It mentions the Cybersecurity Act of 2015, which facilitates information sharing about cyber threats between private and government entities. The report also addresses the vulnerability of the U.S. to cyberattacks, citing the NotPetya and WannaCry incidents, as well as the OPM data breach. It explores the challenges in establishing effective legal policies for cybersecurity, including delays in enactment, technological failures, and clashes between laws and principles. The report concludes by noting the ongoing efforts by the U.S. government to prevent and reduce cybercrimes.

Running head: COOKIES, PRIVACY AND CYBER SECURITY
CYBER SECURITY
October 11
2018

COOKIES, PRIVACY AND CYBER SECURITY 1
Cybersecurity has always been very important for the United States government and that
too from centuries. Due to globalization, advancements in IT and E-commerce sector, the rise in
cybercrime had caused a drastic loss to not only to the government but also its citizens. The
United States of America had actually faced the highest number of problem in the year 2016.
The cybercrimes rose up to millions of cases on daily basis not only in the technology but also in
the personal aspects (PwC, 2018).
The main and foremost concept of cybersecurity is too aware the companies about the
cybercrimes happening around. Attacks such as Trojan horses, phishing, viruses, denial of
service (DOS), control system hacks and stealing of intellectual property or the confidential
information are known as "Cyberattacks". The main aim is to force companies and individuals to
protect their very own personal and confidential data from cyberattack. (Nortan, 2017)
Cybersecurity Act of 2015 which was approved by the United State of Congress actually
helped both the private and government-owned IT firms and various other companies to come up
with all the problems related to cyberattacks (Raul, 2017). And under this act, the information
regarding the threats or fear of any cybercrime can be easily transmitted to one company to
another, in order to rectify the same. And through sharing and gathering of such information, the
government can smoothly be able to synchronize between defensive and intelligence actions. On
17th February 2018, the co-founder of computer security firm Crowd Strike old in an exclusive
report that the United States of America is "defenseless" or in "danger" to cybersecurity attacks
and the government badly need to gear up their defense strategies in any manner (Amaro, &
Gamble, 2017).

COOKIES, PRIVACY AND CYBER SECURITY 2
The two most recent attacks were: NotPetya and WannaCry which affected companies
Worldwide. It caused a loss of millions of dollars. Also, in 2015 OPM (office of personnel
management) have given a report that information which is very important given to China had
been used to blackmail or threaten American citizens (Kostopoulos, 2013).
The U.S. has although still going through the ways to establish such legal policies in
which information is to be collected through cybersecurity internally; in fact it has used it to
disassemble entire system (Mendoza, 2017). Also the country has launched cyberwarfare and
attempted for the same in North Korea for Nuclear Weapons and also to disarm Iran nuclear
systems. The reasons of legal policy issue are varied in numbers. Sometimes either the time
lapse out or else the technological aspects fails.
In the present scenario US government has been facing many problems regarding the
cyber laws execution the situations are not in favor. Government has been facing situations like-
1. Delay in enactments of legal policies.
2. The policies kept falling with regards to time.
3. Legal and technical Heterogeneity.
4. Clashes between laws and principles.
5. Limitation on the scope of application.
Overall, the cyber laws have had become as one of the most burning topics of all times in
order to take down the bar many preventions have been taken by the US government in order to
recover from cyberattacks and also to respond and reduces the cybercrimes from minds of the
people.

COOKIES, PRIVACY AND CYBER SECURITY 3
References
Amaro, S. & Gamble, H.(2017). US government is ‘exceptionally vulnerable' to cyberattacks, a
security expert. CNBC. Retrieved from: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/17/us-
government-is-exceptionally-vulnerable-to-cyberattacks-security-expert-says.html
Kostopoulos, G. (2013). Cyberspace and cybersecurity. Boca Raton, USA: Taylor & Francis
Group
Mendoza, M.A. (2017). Challenges and implications of cybersecurity legislation. Retrieved
from: https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/03/13/challenges-implications-
cybersecurity-legislation/
Nortan. (2017). Top 5 cybercrimes in the U.S. United States. Retrieved from:
https://us.norton.com/internetsecurity-online-scams-top-5-cybercrimes-in-america-
norton-cyber-security-insights-report.html
PwC. (2018). Pulling fraud out of the shadows. Retrieved from
https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/services/advisory/forensics/economic-crime-
survey.html#cta-1
Raul, A. (2017). The privacy, data protection, and cybersecurity law review. London, UK:
Gideon Robertson