Smith 1

Hyrum Smith
Mrs. Hull
English 2010
September 27, 2016
Cybersecurity
In the recent discussion of cybersecurity, a controversial issue has been what is the best
way to better secure the United States government from cyber-attacks. On the one hand, some,
such as Patrick Marshall, Writer for the Congressional Quarterly Inc, argues that the actions
taken to stop cybercrime is very inadequate compared to what we should be doing. On the other
hand, others, such as Marcia Clemmitt, a correspondent for a Division of SAGE, argues that
maybe we could have good hackers help with the cybercrime against the US. Still others, such
as Rolan Flamini, World Affairs journalist, argue we should try to control crime by controlling
internet content, like other countries have already implemented. These various perspectives
show us that this issue is not only present for the government, leaves a lot of people not exactly
sure on what to do to stop cybercrime. We have a lot of potential threats, that are pretty big
threats.
He talks about the hacks in 1997 and how For three days, the hackers had access to
Department of Defense. (799) Marshall summarizes some examples of cyber-attacks that
happened in the past. He makes it sound like some of the hackers are as good as the people on
mission impossible. He explains how unsecure our government was back then. Then he
explains a lot abouto cities and their supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA)
systems. (799) Marshal explains some of the dangers of hackers controlling it If Hackers gain
control of a SCADA system, they can manipulate whatever it controls such as a gas line, power

Smith 2
grid or the floodgates of a dam. (799). Marshall brings out how much human civilization relies
on technology.
Marshal states Government and private-sector computer and security experts agree
Americas cyberinfrastructure is at risk. (801) But the government disagrees saying there are
vulnerabilities but not many
people have the computer or
the man power to attack
those vulnerabilities. While
at the same time, the people
that do have the man power
and computer power to
attack, dont really want to
bring down the internet.
Marshal states Hacker have not launched such an attack yet because they know they would be
fouling their own nest. (802) If hackers were to take out the internet they would be harming
themselves Marshall clarifies.
Marshall adds Rather than destroying a penetrated network, hackers might choose to
control it (802). Its easier to destroy something than create it (Marshall, 802). He conveys
the information on a hacked system could potentially do more damage to a company than what it
would if the hacker was to just destroy they system. He expresses selling confidential
information on the black market could cause the company to go out of business. Or to lose
credibility with other companies so no one wants to work with them.

Smith 3
He changes his article and asserts a way to stop hack while acknowledging that there will
always be a way to get into your system. He declares we need to protect our infrastructures more
and find better ways to stop the attacks recommended several steps that could be taken
including educational programs, research and development and creation of a policy making
office. (Marshal 809) Marshal finishes by talking about how the penalties for hacking are not
threatening enough and how we should have greater punishment.
Marshal starts by giving real examples of hacks that happened, that is the factual logos
part. He also uses pathos when he is giving these facts because most people arent a fan of their
personal information being stolen. He focuses about how if specific systems were to be
hacked then we would be in big danger. That makes it sound not as factual, because he is basing
his paper on something that might happen or that could be in danger. He indicates right after
explains how there was a power outage that a lot of people thought happened from a hack but
ended up just having something wrong with the company. Still not very useful to his argument,
because doesnt back up his argument just sounds like an illogical fallacy. But his ending seems
to be good in the sense that he gives some good examples of what we can do to solve them. But
his solution might scare some people from learning how to stop hackers.
Clemmit starts by talking about some cool recreation things that we do that help bring out
goog hackers. She talks about how we have a lot of dangerous hackers out there, but then
shows there are also a lot of people that will help get rid of crime from hacking. Ironically,
experts say, the only way to thwart the attacks is to hire people possessing many of the same
technical skills and personality traits as the perpetrators. (Clemmitt 759). She says we need
people that know how to hack to stop the hackers. And Explain how we can use hackers to find
security flaws in a system, so that we can see what we need to fix to stop the real people that

Smith 4
pose a threat. for example by finding security flaws in computer programs and developing
useful open-source software. (Clemmitt 760) She talks a lot about how not all hackers are there
for danger, and if you use the good ones in the right way they can actually help stop the bad ones
from causing any harm. She moves the idea of finding solutions to the security flaws that we
have in our system and filling in the holes before the bad hackers go through them. Although
she explains when finding these good hackers, we need to we need to make sure that we are
finding true good hackers, and at the same time we cant take to threatening measures. She
explains by creating laws against hacking, it scares the bad hackers from attacking a little. While
at the same time it scares the good hackers even more from learning the loopholes in the different
programs. we have to make sure that we have deterrence for those that are doing wrong
(Clemmitt 763) While at the same time we do need to make sure that the bad hackers are getting
penalized. She talks about the big debate on what makes you a good hacker and what makes you
a bad hacker. within Anonymous, there is a vigorous debate over what tactic are legitimate
(Clemmitt 766) She shares how there are a lot of lines that get moved on what is and what is not
ok for hackers to do, or what makes you a good or a bad hacker. Finding the good hackers might
not be the easiest thing to do.
Flamini brings in a new idea of how maybe the best way to stop hackers is not in finding
good hackers, but in limiting what is on the internet. Flamini believes that we should limit our
internet content. He talks how some hackers arent really looking for money or information, they
sometimes like to just block people from information. They ways they have done this is by
sending a ton of emails to a webpage and backed up the servers so no one could log on. Instead
they flooded the website with e-mails to keep customers from being able to log on. (Flamini
159) by limiting what was on the website, or who could get to the web site they may have been

Smith 5
able to prevent this from happening. He explains how sometimes the best way to prevent hacks
is to understand who the hacker is and what their purpose is, but it is not always an easy task.
What really is the best way to keep everyone secure? There is a lot of threat and people
can see the danger on what is there. There is also a lot of different ideas on what could be done to
fix this problem. Right now the way some security teams get hired is by conventions that test
your abilities to hack. A great example is Deaf-con, this is a convention where hackers get
together and get tested on who can hack different things the fastest. Or they test people on who
can secure an infrastructure the best. This a scenario where companies use good hackers to in
their systems. Most system administrators limit what part of their infrastructure is available
online. That is an example of limiting what is on the internet. But is there really a best way to
stop cyber-attacks, is there really a way to prevent the attacks from happening.

Smith 6

Works Cited
Clemmitt, Marcia. Computer Hacking. CQ Researcher, Sept. 16, 2011 Division of
SAGE Accessed on 16 Sept. 2016
Flamini Roland. Improving Cybersecurity CQ Researcher, Feb. 15, 2013
www.cqresarcher.com CQ press Accessed on 16 Sept. 2016
Marshall Patrick. Cybersecurity CQ Researcher, Sept. 26, 2003. Congressional
Quarterly Accessed on 16 Sept. 2016

Control Room Design. Digital image. Quanare Enginering. Press Customizer, 2016. Web.
27 Sept. 2016.