America’s Slipping Edge—Cyber Saturday
America must fight to keep ahead of adversaries such as China when it comes to technology and innovation, a cybersecurity group chartered by the Aspen Institute warns in a new report.
The Aspen Cyber Group, a nonprofit organization that convenes a security-focused partnership between the public and private sectors in the U.S., released a report this week warning that the conditions that led to American prosperity—and supremacy—in the post-World War II era “no longer exist and are unlikely to be seen again.”
The paper hits like a bucket of ice-cold water. It’s a painful reality check—and an alarming wake-up call urging the nation not to rest on its laurels. If America does not lead in innovation in the years ahead, the world runs the “risk that new technologies will be developed and implemented by nations that do not share values of liberty and freedom.”
The subtext of the report is, obviously, China. While the paper does not directly state the most worrisome concerns—that new technologies, created abroad, could propel censorship, surveillance, and the persecution of state-disfavored populations—it does chide the U.S. for falling behind in many basic areas of economic investment. China is, in contrast, pouring loads of money into infrastructure, research and development, and science and engineering education. In case one needed any convincing, the strategy is deliberately “designed to leapfrog the United States and Europe.”
The paper echoes concerns that Michael Kratsios, the White House’s chief technology officer, shared with me in a recent meeting at Fortune’s offices. If there is one thing that needs more coverage by business news media, he said, it is the threat that up-and-coming technologies will not be designed with “American values” in mind. Sure, the U.S. came out ahead in decades past, pioneering transformational technologies such as transistors, personal computers, the Internet, GPS, and countless other innovations. But a whole new set of technologies are coming onto the scene, and they’re poised to upend the world as we know it: artificial intelligence, quantum computing, 5G networking, and plenty else.
America faces a major competitive threat these days, and we all would do well to remember how inextricably linked are national security, economic security, and cybersecurity. I will leave you with some concluding thoughts from the Aspen Cyber Group. “We cannot wait for the next Sputnik moment—whether in quantum computing, artificial intelligence (AI), or some yet-to-be-discovered technology—to focus our national attention and efforts,” the paper says. “Much is at stake.”
Robert Hackett | @rhhackett | robert.hackett@fortune.com