Good Morning:
Once the Algorithm realizes you’re into dog shirts, it turns out there are dog shirts everywhere.
Friday on #DogShirtTV, I hung out with various estimable members of the Greek Chorus to reflect on just how weird it is that my blog is now fifteen years old and a media institution:
The Situation
In Thursday’s “The Situation” column, I reflect on the growth of Lawfare, which turned 15 years old on Sept. 1.
We imagined it as a blog for the three of us that would focus on wonky legal issues that we were all obsessed with but which didn’t have wide penetration in the public consciousness. We imagined it as focused on counterterrorism—which was then the overpowering concern of American national security policy.
I never imagined the broad expansion of topics the site has undertaken over the years. I never imagined our expansion into technology policy, much less that Lawfare would become a hub of discussion of undersea cables. I never imagined us becoming a locus of discussion of the protection of democracy from America’s own government.
And in Sunday’s “The Situation” column, I pointed out the reason why the president is in such a hurry all of a sudden to indict his political opponents:
To be precise, Comey’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee took place on September 30, 2020. In other words, nine days from today, any ability to charge Comey for any alleged false statement he may have made at that hearing will lapse. Once October arrives, any possibility of prosecuting Comey disappears, barring resort to truly exotic theories under conspiracy law.
Trump’s sense of urgency, in other words, is about the fact that time is tick tick ticking away rather quickly. For a case to materialize against Comey, Trump needs by month’s end to install leadership at the Eastern District of Virginia willing actually to take the case against Comey to a grand jury. That leadership would then have to convince a grand jury to indict. It would have to find a way to get around whatever it is that Richman said to convince Siebert—a prosecutor who had every reason to keep the president happy—that there is no charge to bring. But the thing is, events around the country have shown, grand juries will not, in fact, bring just any case a prosecutor asks them to. A lot of ham sandwiches turn out to be walking the streets with impunity.
Friday On Lawfare
Compiled by the estimable Isabel Arroyo.
On Subsea Cables, Europe Should Avoid the Traps of the 5G Debate
Erik Brown argues that Europe should quickly follow the U.S.’s lead in purging critical undersea cables of components manufactured by Chinese companies. Brown compares the threat of untrusted cable equipment to the threat previously posed by Chinese suppliers in 5G networks and lays out policy steps for enhancing cable security.
Unlike the early days of the 5G debate, many European officials today share U.S. concerns regarding the involvement of untrusted vendors such as Huawei and ZTE in their critical digital infrastructure. European governments should quickly adopt guidelines similar to those of the United States to restrict and exclude high-risk equipment and technology from their own subsea cables. Doing so would enhance the security of their digital infrastructure, benefit European firms, and help avoid another unnecessary transatlantic dispute—like that on 5G—over a threat perception now largely shared in the United States in Europe.
Good News: U.S. Investment in Spyware Skyrockets!
In the latest edition of the Seriously Risky Business cybersecurity newsletter, Tom Uren evaluates how recent U.S. investment in spyware contracts could exert some salutary restraining influence on spyware vendors’ behavior, analyzes implications of the TikTok deal, praises government researchers’ work red-teaming private AI developers, and more.
U.S. investors have incentives to ensure that their companies toe the U.S. government's line. Good behavior can result in lucrative government contracts. Paragon, for example, signed a one-year contract with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the dying months of the Biden administration. On the flip side, abuse can result in U.S. government action such as sanctions that slash the value of a business.
An investor allowing a spyware company to do business recklessly may as well just light their cash on fire.
Podcasts
On Lawfare Daily and Scaling Laws, Alan Rozenshtein and Pam Samuelson discuss the tumultuous legal landscape at the intersection of generative AI and copyright law, recent rulings in Bartz v. Anthropic and Kadrey v. Meta, whether training AI models on copyrighted data constitutes transformative fair use, and potential AI-induced “market dilution” effects that harm creators.
Today’s #BeastOfTheDay is the baby elephant, seen here being cruelly teased by a flock of malevolent birds:
In honor of today’s Beast, go hide underneath your mom. The birds can’t find you there.
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