PROGRAMMING NOTE: We’ll be off for Thanksgiving this Thursday and Friday but back to our normal schedule on Monday, Nov. 27.
With help from Maggie Miller and Caitlin Oprysko
Driving the Day
— Leaders at the annual Halifax International Security Forum began to grapple with threats posed by AI technologies, but global conflicts still took center stage.
HAPPY MONDAY, and welcome to MORNING CYBERSECURITY! We’re transnational today, after Maggie spent the weekend at the Halifax Security Forum with our neighbors in the frigid north.
But in other news, I’ve been hearing from some of you about how the jokes are the best part of MC … does that mean I should start expensing improv classes to my boss?
Have any tips or secrets to share with MC? Or thoughts on what we should be covering? Find me on X at @JGedeon1 or email me at [email protected]. You can also follow @POLITICOPro and @MorningCybersec on X. Full team contact info is below. Let’s dive in.
Today’s Agenda
Director of government innovation at the POPVOX Foundation Aubrey Wilson is looking to help communications staffers learn how to use AI through a virtual discussion with the R Street Institute. 11 a.m.
A similar AI guide session will be hosted by the R Street Institute for legislative staffers. 2 p.m.
The New York Cyber Task Force is unveiling its 2023 report focusing on the private sector’s perspective on the current and future state of operational collaboration with the federal government, and will be discussed further in a fireside hosted by Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. 6 p.m.
THE CONFERENCE CIRCUIT
AI FOR THE ALLIES — Artificial intelligence has taken the world by storm over the past year, raising debate about risks and rewards. But at one of the world’s leading security conferences, it’s just entering the chat, as Maggie reports from Halifax, Nova Scotia.
The Halifax International Security Forum, first held in 2009 to rally the world’s democracies against autocratic forces, gathered hundreds of top military personnel, diplomats, activists and lawmakers from around the globe over the weekend to focus on the impacts of Russia’s war in Ukraine.
That conflict and the Israel-Hamas battle largely dominated the three days of talks within the harbor city’s Westin Hotel. But buzz about the future of AI crept into conversations on the sidelines, with interests piqued by the rollout of generative AI platforms over the past year like ChatGPT, as well as the integration of such software into defense efforts.
The conference featured a panel on innovation that delved into AI, along with more relaxed dinner and breakfast discussions focused on the issue. It’s a stark difference from 2022, when AI did not show up on the topical agenda at all, just days ahead of the rollout of ChatGPT. The technology hadn’t appeared on the program since at least 2019.
“In all of the different meetings that we’ve had, there’s been some element of artificial intelligence incorporated into it,” Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee’s cyber subcommittee, said during a press conference Saturday.
— Not always the focus: While officials publicly discussed the importance of AI, in closed-door meetings it still took a backseat to more analog conflict concerns.
“I haven’t had any [AI] conversations while I’ve been here,” said Senate Foreign Relations Committee ranking member Jim Risch (R-Idaho), co-leader of the U.S. congressional delegation to the summit. “It has not been something that’s on everybody’s minds.”
Read more from Maggie (for Pros!) here.
LENDING A HELPING (CYBER) HAND — NATO leadership is serving as a middleman to help foot the bill for private sector companies defending Ukraine’s critical networks against cyberattacks, a top NATO leader told Maggie on the sidelines of the Halifax conference.
“We’re arranging for allies also to fund private sector companies to help them defend their networks, so we are arranging for contracts to be paid to private companies for them to then go and help Ukraine defend,” James Appathurai, the NATO deputy assistant secretary general for emerging security challenges, said Sunday.
Appathurai pointed to the free cybersecurity services that companies such as Google Cloud’s Mandiant and Microsoft have provided to Ukraine since the Russian invasion in early 2022 as being worth “hundreds of millions of euros,” but that support is not sustainable as the war in Ukraine grinds on.
“We can’t expect them to do it for free forever,” Appathurai said. “We need to rethink how we pay private sector firms to do security-related things over the long term. Otherwise, we are leaving it to the whims of their CEOs.”
— We’re all in this together: Beyond Ukraine, NATO is also working to help secure its own member states against both government-backed cyberattacks and cybercriminals. NATO member Albania was hit last year by a massive cyberattack linked to the Iranian government that temporarily crippled government services, and fellow NATO state Montenegro grappled with a separate attack.
Appathurai noted that NATO has also faced “nonstop Russian cyberattacks” amid the war in Ukraine, and that the bloc is working to ensure that nations with less cyber resources are not left as sitting ducks for these attacks.
“One of the things we’re trying to do in NATO is pair up the more advanced countries and the resourced countries with the less advanced and worse resourced countries to help raise all boats together,” he said.
Industry Intel
OPENAI, THE LOBBYIST — The Silicon Valley firm behind ChatGPT — the AI-powered chatbot whose eerily human-like responses prompted this year’s global scramble to regulate the technology — had registered its first federal lobbyists just ahead of the Sam Altman leadership shakeup, POLITICO Influence found in a newly filed disclosure. The move could signal a shift in how OpenAI is engaging in Washington that may have telegraphed its move to oust Altman.
— Who’s who: DLA Piper’s Tony Samp, a former Martin Heinrich staffer who was the founding director of the Senate’s AI Working Group, and Steven Phillips, have been lobbying for OpenAI since Oct. 2, according to the disclosures. Of course, the firm’s relationship with OpenAI dates back to at least this spring, when the firm was helping CEO Sam Altman prepare for a blockbuster AI hearing in the Senate, as our Brendan Bordelon reported a few months ago.
— The big goals: The disclosure filing notes that DLA Piper has been lobbying on “legislative and regulatory proposals and oversight affecting the safe development and deployment of artificial intelligence technologies.”
Keep in mind that OpenAI has a lot of damage control to temper now that the new tech has become the talk of the town, which includes promising to make its own systems more cyber-secure with the White House and other AI giants.
Several vulnerabilities were exposed in OpenAI’s GPT servers last week, which came days after a separate DDoS attack. There was also a data leak in March which included the visibility of payment-related info, causing ChatGPT to be taken down. And don’t get us started on the iris scan.
— In-house charm: Chan Park, who joined the company last month as OpenAI’s head of U.S. policy and partnerships, has been lobbying since Oct. 3 on AI research and development, according to a filing.
Park was previously a principal at Monument Advocacy before moving over to Microsoft’s lobbying team in 2019. Before that, he spent eight years on the Hill, where he was an attorney on the Senate Judiciary Committee, the panel whose subcommittee Altman testified before in May.
On the Hill
WELCOME THE NEW ACTING DIRECTOR — In a move that is looking to be short-lived, the White House has appointed Drenan Dudley, a high-ranking budget expert from within the Office of the National Cyber Director, as its new interim cyber czar.
Dudley’s appointment to the role of acting national cyber director comes as the White House awaits a Senate confirmation vote for Harry Coker, which is expected to take place shortly after the Thanksgiving holiday.
Her name had been floating through cyber circles as a possible fill-in, with MC reporting in last Monday’s issue that industry consensus was building around her skill set.
— Credentials to boot: Dudley, who had been running the critical budget review with the Office of Management and Budget, joined ONCD 15 months ago from the Senate Appropriations committee. Before assuming the acting head role after Kemba Walden stepped down on Friday, she was the deputy national cyber director for strategy and budget.
— Expect a brief tenure: Last Wednesday, the Senate Homeland Security Committee voted largely along party lines to send Coker’s nomination to a full floor vote. In a meeting with reporters, Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) said he is urging Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) to hold the vote after Congress returns from recess.
Tweet of the Day
Cyber needs strong defenders, just like the Fellowship of the (One) Ring
Quick Bytes
CITRIX BLEED — A critical flaw in Citrix remote access software has been exploited by state-backed hackers for weeks and is now being targeted at customers who haven’t applied the patch, Katrina Manson reports for Bloomberg.
CYBER WAR CRIMES — Ukraine has evidence of around 109,000 war crimes, including those attacks on the environment and cyberattacks, Maggie reports from Halifax.
TARGET ON TAIWAN — China is already pursuing a “digital invasion” of Taiwan, though the island’s government is looking to beat China on AI capabilities, a top Taiwanese official told Maggie in Halifax.
Chat soon.
Stay in touch with the whole team: Joseph Gedeon ([email protected]); John Sakellariadis ([email protected]); Maggie Miller ([email protected]); and Heidi Vogt ([email protected]).
