Over the past few weeks things cyber have blown up in our faces once again. While some of the media noticed, the gist of the reporting was on who was doing what to us now, not the growing scandal of our essentially supine reaction to it.

Back on March 12, DNI James Clapper gave the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence a worldwide threat assessment, in which cyber led the list. Despite the fact that the Obama administration had gone public on the threat of Chinese cyberattacks at about the same time, Clapper certainly didn’t seem all that concerned. As with the Obama White House, his emphasis was on potential threats to U.S. public infrastructure (electrical grids, transportation systems, water works). However, these he judged to be minimal for the next two years, first, because of the sophistication involved and, second, because those with the ability now—Russia and China—”are unlikely to launch such a devastating attack against the United States outside of a military conflict or crisis that they believe threatens their vital interests.” Incidentally, Clapper expressed the opinion that infrastructure attacks, when they do come, are more likely to come from nonstate actors, i.e., those who won’t be sophisticated enough for at least a couple of years.