In the wake of high-profile hacks of Sony Pictures, US Central Command and JPMorgan Chase, among other victims, Obama called the threat of cyberattacks a “national emergency.”
The new order allows the US government to levy economic sanctions against individuals overseas who engage in cyberattacks that damage the “national security, foreign policy, economic health or financial stability of the United States,” according to the president’s announcement.
In addition to those perpetrating the attacks, the order also allows the government to apply sanctions against individuals and entities who knowingly use and receive the data stolen, which draws concerns about foreign news outlets interested in publishing sensitive US material.
The ability to target foreign news agencies if they publish material the US government considers damaging to national security could be considered a form of censorship.
— Christopher Soghoian (@csoghoian) April 1, 2015
Plenty of foreign outlets have already published information from top-secret documents – or the documents themselves – leaked by National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden.
The publication of those documents – some of which accuse the US intelligence community of infiltrating computer systems to eavesdrop on targets – compromise national security, the government asserts.
The government also has accused WikiLeaks, the infamous secret-spilling organization, of endangering national security when it published State Department and Pentagon documents taken by US Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning.
After coming under pressure from the US government, the companies that processed donations to WikiLeaks stopped servicing the group.
Manning, the Army intelligence analyst, and Snowden have both been charged with espionage. The former is serving a 35-year prison sentence, while Snowden remains in exile in Russia.
Those already alarmed by the government’s reach in the digital age wonder if this executive order further empowers the US to silence journalists and would-be activists under an order that purportedly was designed to punish foreign entities hostile to America.
