Five myths about Chinese hackers: The Washington Post

On 3/22, James Lewis (CSIS) wrote an interesting article for The Washington Post titled Five myths about Chinese hackers.  Lewis noted that the Chinese have hacked a lot of American computer systems, but perhaps that spotlight has led to “exaggeration and myths that need to be discarded.”  Lewis lays out five arguments:

1. We are not in a cyber cold war with China.
2. China’s hackers are not unstoppable cyberwarriors (in fact, the problem is more “that U.S. companies are so inept.”)
3. China is unlikely to launch crippling attacks on critical U.S. infrastructure (they would rather target PACOM).
4. Lewis claims that pervasive Chinese cyberexploitation is not causing the greatest transfer of wealth in history.  Indeed, Lewis believes we can’t really put a dollar amount on our IP losses (he ballparks $100 billion a year) and this cyberexploitation “probably isn’t even slowing the U.S. economy.”  Lewis does note that the US has underestimated the damage from military technology theft.
5. Lewis said that the USG’s cyberespionage does not necessarily justify China’s cyberexploitation, so even though America spies on China, it should still be able to complain about cyberexploitation.  He then suggests “[t]he United States and other countries need to make that line [between cyberexploitation and cyberespionage] clearer and discourage China from crossing it.”

I was disappointed with Mr. Lewis’ article.  While he’s always advocated moderation, he seems to come off as a bit of a China apologist here.  The claim that China’s cyberexploitation “probably isn’t even slowing the U.S. economy” is just a complete shot in the dark, and seems to ignore the future impact that this level of IP theft will have on the country.  Also, he plays down the impact of cyberexploitation in #4, but then suggests the U.S. must draw a line for China in #5.  Why draw a politically difficult line in the sand for an issue that “isn’t even slowing the U.S. economy?”

China definitely gets overplayed in the boogeyman role, but Mr. Lewis goes too far in downplaying its threat.