Fighting Insider Abuse After Van Buren
By Bryan Cunningham, John Grant, Chris Jay Hoofnagle
Friday, June 11, 2021, 12:53 PM
The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Van Buren v. United States on June 3 was a significant victory for civil liberties groups, researchers, the defense bar and others troubled by the broad reading of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) urged by the government. Writing for the majority, Justice Amy Coney Barrett correctly, in our view, struck down the “broad” view of the CFAA in a 6-3 vote. The majority rejected the government’s expansive interpretation of the statute that would have empowered private companies, simply by the way they drafted employee policies or terms of service, to criminalize “a breathtaking amount of commonplace computer activity.” The Van Buren decision established that, going forward, to violate the CFAA, a user must access data from part of a device or network to which the user is not permitted access. This is a far steeper bar than the government’s preferred reading of the CFAA, which would have criminalized “misuse” of data—to which the user had authorized access—under policies dictated by the data owner.
(more…)CNN Newsroom With Pamela Brown: Cyber Attack Threat with Bryan Cunningham
Biden weighs direct action against Russian targets following cyberattacks
WJLA.com
by Leandra Bernstein
Thursday, June 3rd 2021
Between the massive SolarWinds hack that targeted U.S. government agencies and the debilitating ransomware attack that shut down Colonial Pipeline last month, the targeting of the global meatpacking giant JBS, marked the third major cyberattack the administration has laid at the feet of the Russian government in less than two months.
UCI advances to national cyber defense competition following “historic” regionals win
UCI News
April 6, 2021
A team of undergraduate students from the cybersecurity club in UCI’s Department of Computer Science is moving on to the National Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition following their recent first-place finish in the Western Regionals against several formidable opponents. Only the winners out of the nine regionals across the nation can directly advance to the national competition.
(more…)UCI Cybersecurity Group To Help Counter Threats
By Kevin Costelloe
January 18, 2021
With cybersecurity taking on even greater prominence, the Cybersecurity Policy & Research Institute at the University of California, Irvine will be undertaking several initiatives to analyze and help counter increasingly dangerous computer threats.
“The UCI Cybersecurity Policy & Research Institute will continue our research and scholarship efforts in 2021 to meet the many cybersecurity-related challenges facing Orange County, the United States, and the world,” said CPRI Executive Director Bryan Cunningham.
(more…)Covid Crimes: Espionage, Hackers And Why America Is Vulnerable
by Nicole Fisher
July 28, 2020
With millions of lives and trillions of dollars at stake, the U.S. is in a dangerous place when it comes to vulnerabilities associated with the pandemic – one of which is cybersecurity. To understand just what we’re facing, Forbes asked Bryan Cunningham, long-time cybersecurity and privacy lawyer and Founding Executive Director of the University of California, Irvine Cybersecurity Policy & Research Institute, exactly what’s going on, what the focus should be, and what precautions Americans should be taking.
(more…)At-Home Workers Face Hacking Threat
CYBERSECURITY: Changing Workforce Boosts Crowdstrike
By Kevin Costelloe
Monday, June 15, 2020
Bryan Cunningham, head of University of California-Irvine’s cybersecurity institute, says foreign government agents are increasingly trying to swipe information about the hunt for a vaccine for COVID-19, the latest example of hackers targeting those working from home during the pandemic.
(more…)Critical Mass Radio Show – Episode 1273: Bryan Cunningham
March 6, 2020
Individuals, corporations, governments, and other institutions face unprecedented vulnerabilities in a world where everything is increasingly connected. Bryan Cunningham, Executive Director for the UCI Cybersecurity and Policy Institute was on the show to discuss the current challenges companies are facing in the world of cybersecurity.
Listen now on Critical Mass Radio Show
Bryan Cunningham: Our war with Iran did not start or end with the killing of Soleimani
Feb. 11, 2020
Despite hints of de-escalation, tensions between the U.S. and Iran are far from over. Bryan Cunningham, executive director of the Cyber Security Policy & Research Institute at UC Irvine, joined THINK to discuss why Iran will almost certainly launch more cyberattacks against the U.S.
Watch on NBC News.com : Think
Cyberspace is the next front in Iran-US conflict – and private companies may bear the brunt
by Bryan Cunningham
Iran and other nations have waged a stealth cyberwar against the United States for at least the past decade, largely targeting not the government itself but, rather, critical infrastructure companies. This threat to the private sector will get much worse before it gets better and businesses need to be prepared to deal with it.
As in the days of pirates and privateers, much of our nation’s critical infrastructure is controlled by private companies and enemy nations and their proxies are targeting them aggressively.
The U.S.-Iran cyberconflict has simmered for years, but the current crisis boiled over with Iranian attacks on U.S. interests in Iraq that led to the Jan. 3 U.S. drone strike that killed a senior Iranian general and terrorist leader. Iran’s supreme leader threatened “harsh revenge,” but said Iran would limit those efforts to military targets.
Read the entire article at The Conversation