https://www.wsj.com/articles/can-america...?mod=e2two
Can America trust their spies (or can we trust the British spies)? From Peter Hoekstra, former chair of the House intelligence committee (2004-2007)
"...But the cyber battlefield is very different. There the U.S. faces the usual threats and then some. Russia and China are good in cyberspace, and so are the Iranians and Israelis. Does America retain any discernible edge over North Korea or nonstate actors like ISIS or criminal cartels? If so, how great is it?
These are important questions. Cyberspace may become the great equalizer in modern warfare, allowing lesser countries and organizations to pose the kind of threat they never could on the traditional battlefield. Many experts believe that America is dangerously vulnerable. Could a foreign enemy cripple the financial system, shut down part of the electrical grid, or even cause a meltdown at a nuclear power plant?
Just as Americans deserve to know their government is not spying on them, they need assurance that the U.S. is capable of winning wars in cyberspace and protecting the country’s critical infrastructure. On both points, the intelligence community faces a credibility gap.
That is the challenge for the new director of national intelligence, Dan Coats, and the CIA director, Mike Pompeo. In addition to keeping the nation secure, they need to restore trust between America’s spies and its citizens. A good first step would be teaching intelligence agencies to keep their own secrets—so that Americans must once again merely imagine what their spies can do. "
