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Cyber Expert Talks of Threats

Assistant Attorney General John Demers takes aim at China and other bad actors conducting economic espionage, hacking, and related crimes.

       

Boston College Law School, on September 5, co-hosted one of the nation’s top cybersecurity experts. Assistant Attorney General for National Security John C. Demers leads the AG’s China Initiative, established to counter the persistent and aggressive economic espionage, trade-secret theft, hacking, and related crimes conducted by the People’s Republic of China.

“While all are sophisticated cyber actors, China is the number-one nation state threat, followed by Iran, Russia, and North Korea,” said Demers at his BC Law talk. “A seminal moment that motivated the launch of the China Initiative was the repeated theft of American companies’ intellectual property, which reflected a collaborative effort by the PRC and Chinese companies to drive their economic development. If you examine the government’s goals—the development of high-speed rail, artificial intelligence, commercial airlines—it’s a guide to what they steal.”

The event was co-coordinated by Kevin Powers, director of the Master of Science in Cybersecurity Policy and Governance program at the BC’s Woods College of Advancing Studies and assistant professor of the practice at BC Law, and Associate Professor of Law David Olson, faculty director for the Law School’s Program on Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

Read the full BC News story here. Video below.

Photo by Rose Lincoln