Join us for a captivating conversation with John Demers, Fernanda Domingos, Chimène Keitner (Maritimes & New College 1996), and Tarah Wheeler and on cross-border cyber threats, the new frontier where the challenges of national security, international law, privacy, and human rights collide. On May 7, 2021, for the first time in its history, Colonial Pipeline had to shut down the entirety of its gasoline pipeline system. The US-based company had come under a ransomware attack. Hackers had infiltrated the systems, stolen data, and were demanding millions of dollars in ransom. Within days, fuel shortages hit gasoline stations across the East Coast. Less than a month later, the largest beef provider in the US was also hit with a ransomware attack, forcing all its US facilities to shut down. Incidents like these that threaten critical infrastructure and our ability to go about our everyday lives raise important policy questions. How do we hold the perpetrators accountable for cyberattacks that can crisscross borders so easily? Where do we draw the lines between cybercrime and cyberespionage? Is international law up to the task of confronting this new and burgeoning threat? And what are the implications for privacy and human rights?

Speakers:

John Demers, Assistant Attorney General for USDOJ’s National Security Division

Fernanda Domingos, Federal Prosecutor Brazil, Federal Prosecutor's Office of the State of Sao Paulo

Chimène Keitner (Maritimes & New College 1996), Alfred & Hanna Fromm Professor of International Law, UC Hastings Law

Tarah Wheeler, Cyber Project Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs - Harvard University‘s Kennedy School of Government.

Moderated by:

Christopher D'Urso (New Jersey & St John's 2018), DPhil in Public Policy

John Demers, became Assistant Attorney General for National Security on February 22, 2018. In that capacity, he leads the Department of Justice’s efforts to combat national security related cyber-crime, terrorism and espionage, to enforce export control and sanctions laws, to use the authorities of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, and to conduct national security review of foreign investments. In November 2018, John was selected to lead the Attorney General’s China Initiative, put in place to counter the Peoples Republic of China’s persistent and aggressive economic espionage, trade secret theft, hacking and other related crimes.

Prior to rejoining the Department, John was Vice President and Assistant General Counsel at The Boeing Company, where he held several senior positions including in Boeing Defense, Space, and Security and as lead lawyer and head of international government affairs for Boeing International.

From 2006 to 2009, John served on the first leadership team of the National Security Division, first as Senior Counsel to the Assistant Attorney General and then as Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Law & Policy. In addition, he has served in the Office of Legal Counsel and the Office of the Deputy Attorney General. From 2010 to 2017, he taught national security law as an adjunct professor at the Georgetown University Law Center. John worked in private practice in Boston and clerked for Associate Justice Antonin Scalia of the U.S. Supreme Court and Judge Diarmuid O’Scannlain of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He graduated from Harvard Law School and the College of the Holy Cross.

Fernanda Domingos has been a Brazil Federal Prosecutor since 1998 and fighting cybercrime since 2007. She belongs to an Advisory Group on Cybercrime and is Coordinator of Criminal Chamber at the Federal Prosecution Service and Cybercrime Working Group Coordinator at São Paulo Unit and also Human Rights Office - São Paulo Unit. She has a Law degree from Universidade de São Paulo - USP, 1994. She holds Specialist Titles from Escola Superior do Ministério Público do Estado de São Paulo and from Escola Superior do Ministério Público da União. Cybercrime Fight Teaching Experience at Escola Superior do Ministério Público da União in training prosecutors. Currently pursuing a Master II degree on Transnational Law at the Faculty of Law, Political Science and Management at University of Strasbourg - UNISTRA.

Chimène Keitner (Maritimes & New College 1996) is Alfred & Hanna Fromm Professor of International Law at UC Hastings Law in San Francisco. She previously served as the 27th Counselor on International Law in the Legal Adviser’s Office at the U.S. Department of State. Among other publications, she has co-authored Cybercrime vs. Cyberwar: Paradigms for Addressing Malicious Cyber Activity, Foreign Election Interference and International Law, and Attribution by Indictment. For the past three years, she has convened a colloquium at UC Hastings on Democracy, Technology, and Security. Other recent projects include submitting an amicus brief to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in WhatsApp v. NSO Group and testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee on foreign sovereign immunity. She lives in the Bay Area with her husband, three children, and two rescue dogs.

Tarah Wheeler is a Cyber Project Fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University‘s Kennedy School of Government. She is an International Security Fellow at New America leading a new international cybersecurity capacity building project with the Hewlett Foundation’s Cyber Initiative and a US/UK Fulbright Scholar in Cyber Security for the 2020/2021 year. She is an Electronic Frontier Foundation advisory board member, an inaugural contributing cybersecurity expert for the Washington Post, the Brookings Institution’s contributing cybersecurity editor, and a Foreign Policy contributor on cyber warfare. She has appeared on Bloomberg Asia on US-China trade and cybersecurity. She is the author of the best-selling Women In Tech: Take Your Career to The Next Level With Practical Advice And Inspiring Stories. She is an information security researcher, political scientist in the area of international conflict, author, and poker player. She has been Head of Offensive Security & Technical Data Privacy at Splunk & Senior Director of Engineering and Principal Security Advocate at Symantec Website Security. She has led projects at Microsoft Game Studios (Halo and Lips) and architected systems at encrypted mobile communications firm Silent Circle. She has spoken on information security at the European Union, at the Malaysian Securities Commission, for Foreign Policy, the OECD and FTC, at universities such as Stanford, American, West Point, and Oxford, and multiple governmental and industry conferences. She has $3640 in lifetime cashes in the World Series of Poker. Reach her at @tarah.

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Technology & Society: Cybersecurity- Combating Cyber Attacks Across Borders