Thirty years ago this week, I watched the news from Beijing and started shredding my bedding. It was the night before my college graduation, I had been studying Chinese politics, and news had broken that college students just like us had been gunned down in Tiananmen Square after weeks of peaceful and exhilarating democracy protests—carried on international TV. In the iconic square where Mao Zedong had proclaimed the People’s Republic decades before, bespectacled students from China’s best universities had camped out, putting up posters with slogans of freedom in Chinese and English. A “goddess of democracy” figure modeled after the Statue of Liberty embodied their hopes—and ours—for political liberation in China.

On my campus back then were just a handful of students majoring in East Asian studies. Learning of the brutal crackdown in Beijing, we somehow found one another, gathered our friends, and stayed up making hundreds of white armbands for classmates to wear at commencement the next day. Grappling with the cold realities of the “real world” we were about to enter, we didn’t know what else to do. So we tore sheets and cried for what might have been.

The June 4, 1989, massacre was a horrifying spectacle that the Chinese government has sought to erase from national memory ever since. But, 30 years later, contemplating what might have been is more important than ever. In hindsight, Tiananmen Square serves as a continuing reminder about just how much China has defied, and continues to defy, the odds and predictions of experts. The fact is that generations of American policy makers, political scientists, and economists have gotten China wrong more often than they’ve gotten China right. In domestic politics, economic development, and foreign policy, China has charted a surprising path that flies in the face of professional prognostications, general theories about anything, and the experience of other nations.

Read the rest at The Atlantic

"Being at Stanford is a unique experience... Over time I just became interested in how cyberspace is very realistically connected to our everyday life, and on a larger scale, national security." Read more on our FSI blog on how our MIP student, Maho Sugihara, is focusing on cyber policy and its security implications. #MIPFeatureFriday

To thwart the effects of ‘Putinism,’ the American people must first understand the nature of the threat, Michael McFaul told the House Intelligence Committee.

What is “Putinism,” and what threat does it pose to U.S. national security? What steps can the U.S. take to confront it? These are the questions that former U.S. Ambassador to Russia and Freeman Spogli Institute (FSI) Director Michael McFaul sought to answer in his testimony before the House Intelligence Committee on March 28, 2019.

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The committee’s hearing, “Putin’s Playbook: The Kremlin’s Use of Oligarchs, Money and Intelligence in 2016 and Beyond,” focused on the complex web of political and economic forces within Russia, and how they are leveraged abroad to advance Putin’s foreign policy agenda.

Chaired by Representative Adam Schiff, the committee listened as McFaul emphasized the need for foreign policy decision making to be based on the latest data-based research and evidence.

“To contain and thwart the malicious effects of ‘Putinism,’ said McFaul, “the United States government and the American people must first understand the nature of the threat.”

There Goes the Neighborhood

Since Putin’s first term as president in 2000, McFaul explained, the Russian economy has experienced a radical redistribution of property rights, increasing public ownership at the expense of the private sector, and further weakening property protection laws. Strengthened state ownership to support political aims has entrenched Putin’s leadership over the country but not fostered vibrant or sustainable economic growth.

Now You See it, Now You Don’t

To distract from domestic corruption, economic inefficiency and overall inequality, said McFaul, the Kremlin has drawn the public’s attention toward its foreign adversaries, particularly the United States. A fabricated narrative claims that sanctions are a foreign ploy to cause economic stagnation, rather than a diplomatic response to Russian violations of international law.

Putinism On The Move

According to McFaul, Putin leverages several powerful methods of influence, many of which parallel those used within Russia, to further disrupt and weaken the international order:

1. Heavy investment in international media, such as RT and Sputnik International
2. The creation of organizations, fake identities and bots to influence public opinion on non-Russian social media platforms, particularly in the West
3. “Doxing” — the theft of information by digital means with the aim of weakening perceived adversaries
4. The cultivation of direct contacts and financial support with sympathetic non-governmental organizations and individual politicians
5. Strategic business engagements with foreign entities to establish political influence and leverage
6. Mobilization of coercive actors, such as soldiers, mercenaries and even assassins

Although lifting sanctions is a high priority for the Kremlin, noted McFaul, Putin has sought to develop relationships with sympathetic figures in foreign governments and wait for a favorable change in power rather than addressing the primary reasons that sanctions were enacted in the first place.

Defining the U.S. Response

In response to these so-called rules of ‘Putin’s Playbook,’ McFaul has already partnered with Congressman Ro Khanna and Alex Stamos, the Director of the Stanford Internet Observatory, to define and advocate for the specific actions that will protect the United States’ national security, beginning with reforms to deter doxing operations and enhance the cybersecurity of voting infrastructure.

“National security is not a partisan issue,” said McFaul in his testimony before the House Intelligence Committee. “When it comes to national security, if the Russians attack us, they’re not going to just attack the Republicans and leave the Democrats to the side… I want us to get back to the national security threats that threaten all of us together.”

Read Michael McFaul’s complete written testimony.

The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence held a public hearing on Thursday, March 28, 2019, as part of its investigation into Russian influence during and after the 2016 election campaign.

The hearing, "Putin’s Playbook: The Kremlin’s Use of Oligarchs, Money and Intelligence in 2016 and Beyond” included testimony by Michael McFaul, former U.S. Ambassador to Russia and Director of the Freeman Spogli Institute at Stanford University.

Download Complete Testimony (PDF 263 KB)

EXCERPT

To contain and thwart the malicious effects of “Putinism,” the United States government and the American people must first understand the nature of the threat. This testimony focuses onthe nexus of political and economic power within Russia under Putin’s leadership, and how these domestic practices can be used abroad to advance Putin’s foreign policy agenda. Moreover, it is important to underscore that crony capitalism, property rights provided by the state, bribery, and corruption constitute only a few of many different mechanisms used by Putin in his domestic authority and foreign policy abroad.

This testimony proceeds in three parts. Section I describes the evolution of Putin’s system of government at home, focusing in particular on the relationship between the state and big business. Section II illustrates how Putin seeks to export his ideas and practices abroad. Section III focuses on Putin’s specific foreign policy objective of lifting sanctions on Russian individuals and companies.

Watch the C-SPAN recording of the testimony. 

Media Contact: Ari Chasnoff, Assistant Director for Communications, 650-725-2371, chasnoff@stanford.edu

Congress’s annual worldwide-threat hearings are usually scary affairs, during which intelligence-agency leaders run down all the dangers confronting the United States. This year’s January assessment was especially worrisome, because the minds of American citizens were listed as key battlegrounds for geopolitical conflict for the first time. “China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea increasingly use cyber operations to threaten both minds and machines in an expanding number of ways,” wrote Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats. Coats went on to suggest that Russia’s 2016 election interference is only the beginning, with new tactics and deep fakes probably coming soon, and the bad guys learning from experience.

Deception, of course, has a long history in statecraft and warfare. The Greeks used it to win at the Battle of Salamis in the fifth century b.c. The Allies won the Second World War in Europe with a surprise landing at Normandy—which hinged on an elaborate plan to convince Hitler that the invasion would be elsewhere. Throughout the Cold War, the Soviets engaged in extensive “active measure” operations, using front organizations, propaganda, and forged American documents to peddle half-truths, distortions, and outright lies in the hope of swaying opinion abroad.

But what makes people susceptible to deception? A colleague and I recently launched the two-year Information Warfare Working Group at Stanford. Our first assignment was to read up on psychology research, which drove home how vulnerable we all are to wishful thinking and manipulation.

Read the rest at The Atlantic

Cyber Initiative grantees and researchers in the news, February 2019

Here is a selection of Cyber Initiative grantee and researcher publications and citations for February 2019:

1-30-2019:  Larry Diamond “Chinese Influence, American Interests” in The Diplomat. 

1-30-19:  Michelle Mello “Stanford’s Michelle Mello on Latest Measles Outbreak” in SLS Blogs.  

1/31/19:  Matthew Gentzkow “How Quitting Facebook Could Change Your Life” in Fortune.  

1/30/29:  Matthew Gentzkow “This is Your Brain Off Facebook” in Health.   

2/3/19:  Herb Lin “Atomic Scientists: Hunanity flirting with annhilation” in Tribune.   

2/4/19:  Matthew Gentzkow “Quitting Facebook makes people happier, study finds” in Irish Examiner.   

2/6/19:  Herb Lin “Add cybersecurity to Doomsday Clock concerns, says Bulletin of Atomic Scientists” in CSO.  

2/6/19:  Herb Lin “Add cybersecurity to Doomsday Clock concerns, says Bulletin of Atomic Scientists” in CIO.  

2/8/19:  Elaine Treharne “Statement on the Hoover Institution” in The Stanford Daily.  

2/13/19:  Michelle Mello “Stanford’s Michael Wald on Vaccinations, Children’s Rights, and the Law” in The Stanford Report.  

2/15/19:  Fei-Fei Li and Elaine Treharne “Human-centered Artificial Intelligence Initiative talks AI, humanities and the arts” in The Stanford Daily.  

2/19/19:  Fei-Fei Li “5 Women advancing AI industry research” in Tech Talks.  

2/19/19:  Fei-Fei Li “10 AI influencers you should be following on Twitter” in Siliconrepublic.com.  

2/22/19 Larry Diamond “Utah Against Health Insurance” in New York Times.  

2/23/19 Sharad Goel “Algorithms Can Decide Pre-Trial Jail” in urbanmilwaukee.  

2/25/19:  Dan Boneh “Zether developers from Stanford aim to add new layer of privacy to Ethereum” in Dapp Life.  

2/26/19:  Susan Athey “Ripple Lead on Questions – Student Seeks Clarification for Promoting XRP Over Bitcoin in Stanford University" in CoinGape.  

2/26/19:  Larry Diamond “George Pyle: Utah’s Medicaid reversal makes us a fool coast-to-coast” in Salt Lake Tribune.  

2/27/19:  Arnold Milstein “AI will not solve health care challenges now, but there are innovative alternatives, researcher writes” in Scope.

2/28/19:  Dan Boneh “New Privacy Protocol Zether Can Conceal Ethereum Transactions” in Blockonomi.  

2/28/19:  Jure Leskovec “Species evolve ways to back up life's machinery” in Phys.org.  

2/28/19: Matthew Gentzkow “What happens when you get off Facebook for four weeks? Stanford researchers found out” in Recode.