“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” -U.S. Constitution, First Amendment.
Image: Shutterstock, zimmytws.
In an address to Congress this month, President Trump claimed he had “brought free speech back to America.” But barely two months into his second term, the president has waged an unprecedented attack on the First Amendment rights of journalists, students, universities, government workers, lawyers and judges.
This story explores a slew of recent actions by the Trump administration that threaten to undermine all five pillars of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which guarantees freedoms concerning speech, religion, the media, the right to assembly, and the right to petition the government and seek redress for wrongs.
THE RIGHT TO PETITION
The right to petition allows citizens to communicate with the government, whether to complain, request action, or share viewpoints — without fear of reprisal. But that right is being assaulted by this administration on multiple levels. For starters, many GOP lawmakers are now heeding their leadership’s advice to stay away from local town hall meetings and avoid the wrath of constituents affected by the administration’s many federal budget and workforce cuts.
Another example: President Trump recently fired most of the people involved in processing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for government agencies. FOIA is an indispensable tool used by journalists and the public to request government records, and to hold leaders accountable.
The biggest story by far this week was the bombshell from The Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg, who recounted how he was inadvertently added to a Signal group chat with National Security Advisor Michael Waltz and 16 other Trump administration officials discussing plans for an upcoming attack on Yemen.
One overlooked aspect of Goldberg’s incredible account is that by planning and coordinating the attack on Signal — which features messages that can auto-delete after a short time — administration officials were evidently seeking a way to avoid creating a lasting (and potentially FOIA-able) record of their deliberations.
“Intentional or not, use of Signal in this context was an act of erasure—because without Jeffrey Goldberg being accidentally added to the list, the general public would never have any record of these communications or any way to know they even occurred,” Tony Bradley wrote this week at Forbes.
Petitioning the government, particularly when it ignores your requests, often requires challenging federal agencies in court. But that becomes far more difficult if the most competent law firms start to shy away from cases that may involve crossing the president and his administration.
On March 22, the president issued a memorandum that directs heads of the Justice and Homeland Security Departments to “seek sanctions against attorneys and law firms who engage in frivolous, unreasonable and vexatious litigation against the United States,” or in matters that come before federal agencies.
The POTUS recently issued several executive orders railing against specific law firms with attorneys who worked legal cases against him. On Friday, the president announced that the law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meager & Flom had agreed to provide $100 million in pro bono work on issues that he supports.
Trump issued another order naming the firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, which ultimately agreed to pledge $40 million in pro bono legal services to the president’s causes.
Other Trump executive orders targeted law firms Jenner & Block and WilmerHale, both of which have attorneys that worked with special counsel Robert Mueller on the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. But this week, two federal judges in separate rulings froze parts of those orders.
“There is no doubt this retaliatory action chills speech and legal advocacy, and that is qualified as a constitutional harm,” wrote Judge Richard Leon, who ruled against the executive order targeting WilmerHale.
President Trump recently took the extraordinary step of calling for the impeachment of federal judges who rule against the administration. Trump called U.S. District Judge James Boasberg a “Radical Left Lunatic” and urged he be removed from office for blocking deportation of Venezuelan alleged gang members under a rarely invoked wartime legal authority.
In a rare public rebuke to a sitting president, U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Roberts issued a statement on March 18 pointing out that “For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision.”
The U.S. Constitution provides that judges can be removed from office only through impeachment by the House of Representatives and conviction by the Senate. The Constitution also states that judges’ salaries cannot be reduced while they are in office.
Undeterred, House Speaker Mike Johnson this week suggested the administration could still use the power of its purse to keep courts in line, and even floated the idea of wholesale eliminating federal courts.
“We do have authority over the federal courts as you know,” Johnson said. “We can eliminate an entire district court. We have power of funding over the courts, and all these other things. But desperate times call for desperate measures, and Congress is going to act, so stay tuned for that.”
FREEDOM OF ASSEMBLY
President Trump has taken a number of actions to discourage lawful demonstrations at universities and colleges across the country, threatening to cut federal funding for any college that supports protests he deems “illegal.”
A Trump executive order in January outlined a broad federal crackdown on what he called “the explosion of antisemitism” on U.S. college campuses. This administration has asserted that foreign students who are lawfully in the United States on visas do not enjoy the same free speech or due process rights as citizens.
Reuters reports that the acting civil rights director at the Department of Education on March 10 sent letters to 60 educational institutions warning they could lose federal funding if they don’t do more to combat anti-semitism. On March 20, Trump issued an order calling for the closure of the Education Department.
Meanwhile, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents have been detaining and trying to deport pro-Palestinian students who are legally in the United States. The administration is targeting students and academics who spoke out against Israel’s attacks on Gaza, or who were active in campus protests against U.S. support for the attacks. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters Thursday that at least 300 foreign students have seen their visas revoked under President Trump, a far higher number than was previously known.
In his first term, Trump threatened to use the national guard or the U.S. military to deal with protesters, and in campaigning for re-election he promised to revisit the idea.
“I think the bigger problem is the enemy from within,” Trump told Fox News in October 2024. “We have some very bad people. We have some sick people, radical left lunatics. And I think they’re the big — and it should be very easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military, because they can’t let that happen.”
This term, Trump acted swiftly to remove the top judicial advocates in the armed forces who would almost certainly push back on any request by the president to use U.S. soldiers in an effort to quell public protests, or to arrest and detain immigrants. In late February, the president and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth fired the top legal officers for the military services — those responsible for ensuring the Uniform Code of Military Justice is followed by commanders.
Military.com warns that the purge “sets an alarming precedent for a crucial job in the military, as President Donald Trump has mused about using the military in unorthodox and potentially illegal ways.” Hegseth told reporters the removals were necessary because he didn’t want them to pose any “roadblocks to orders that are given by a commander in chief.”
FREEDOM OF THE PRESS
President Trump has sued a number of U.S. news outlets, including 60 Minutes, CNN, The Washington Post, The New York Times and other smaller media organizations for unflattering coverage.
In a $10 billion lawsuit against 60 Minutes and its parent Paramount, Trump claims they selectively edited an interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris prior to the 2024 election. The TV news show last month published transcripts of the interview at the heart of the dispute, but Paramount is reportedly considering a settlement to avoid potentially damaging its chances of winning the administration’s approval for a pending multibillion-dollar merger.
The president sued The Des Moines Register and its parent company, Gannett, for publishing a poll showing Trump trailing Harris in the 2024 presidential election in Iowa (a state that went for Trump). The POTUS also is suing the Pulitzer Prize board over 2018 awards given to The New York Times and The Washington Post for their coverage of purported Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Whether or not any of the president’s lawsuits against news organizations have merit or succeed is almost beside the point. The strategy behind suing the media is to make reporters and newsrooms think twice about criticizing or challenging the president and his administration. The president also knows some media outlets will find it more expedient to settle.
Trump also sued ABC News and George Stephanopoulos for stating that the president had been found liable for “rape” in a civil case [Trump was found liable of sexually abusing and defaming E. Jean Carroll]. ABC parent Disney settled that claim by agreeing to donate $15 million to the Trump Presidential Library.
Following the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, Facebook blocked President Trump’s account. Trump sued Meta, and after the president’s victory in 2024 Meta settled and agreed to pay Trump $25 million: $22 million would go to his presidential library, and the rest to legal fees. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg also announced Facebook and Instagram would get rid of fact-checkers and rely instead on reader-submitted “community notes” to debunk disinformation on the social media platform.
Brendan Carr, the president’s pick to run the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), has pledged to “dismantle the censorship cartel and restore free speech rights for everyday Americans.” But on January 22, 2025, the FCC reopened complaints against ABC, CBS and NBC over their coverage of the 2024 election. The previous FCC chair had dismissed the complaints as attacks on the First Amendment and an attempt to weaponize the agency for political purposes.
According to Reuters, the complaints call for an investigation into how ABC News moderated the pre-election TV debate between Trump and Biden, and appearances of then-Vice President Harris on 60 Minutes and on NBC’s “Saturday Night Live.”
Since then, the FCC has opened investigations into NPR and PBS, alleging that they are breaking sponsorship rules. The Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT), a think tank based in Washington, D.C., noted that the FCC is also investigating KCBS in San Francisco for reporting on the location of federal immigration authorities.
“Even if these investigations are ultimately closed without action, the mere fact of opening them – and the implicit threat to the news stations’ license to operate – can have the effect of deterring the press from news coverage that the Administration dislikes,” the CDT’s Kate Ruane observed.
Trump has repeatedly threatened to “open up” libel laws, with the goal of making it easier to sue media organizations for unfavorable coverage. But this week, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear a challenge brought by Trump donor and Las Vegas casino magnate Steve Wynn to overturn the landmark 1964 decision in New York Times v. Sullivan, which insulates the press from libel suits over good-faith criticism of public figures.
The president also has insisted on picking which reporters and news outlets should be allowed to cover White House events and participate in the press pool that trails the president. He barred the Associated Press from the White House and Air Force One over their refusal to call the Gulf of Mexico by another name.
And the Defense Department has ordered a number of top media outlets to vacate their spots at the Pentagon, including CNN, The Hill, The Washington Post, The New York Times, NBC News, Politico and National Public Radio.
“Incoming media outlets include the New York Post, Breitbart, the Washington Examiner, the Free Press, the Daily Caller, Newsmax, the Huffington Post and One America News Network, most of whom are seen as conservative or favoring Republican President Donald Trump,” Reuters reported.
FREEDOM OF SPEECH
Shortly after Trump took office again in January 2025, the administration began circulating lists of hundreds of words that government staff and agencies shall not use in their reports and communications.
The Brookings Institution notes that in moving to comply with this anti-speech directive, federal agencies have purged countless taxpayer-funded data sets from a swathe of government websites, including data on crime, sexual orientation, gender, education, climate, and global development.
The New York Times reports that in the past two months, hundreds of terabytes of digital resources analyzing data have been taken off government websites.
“While in many cases the underlying data still exists, the tools that make it possible for the public and researchers to use that data have been removed,” The Times wrote.
On Jan. 27, Trump issued a memo (PDF) that paused all federally funded programs pending a review of those programs for alignment with the administration’s priorities. Among those was ensuring that no funding goes toward advancing “Marxist equity, transgenderism, and green new deal social engineering policies.”
According to the CDT, this order is a blatant attempt to force government grantees to cease engaging in speech that the current administration dislikes, including speech about the benefits of diversity, climate change, and LGBTQ issues.
“The First Amendment does not permit the government to discriminate against grantees because it does not like some of the viewpoints they espouse,” the CDT’s Ruane wrote. “Indeed, those groups that are challenging the constitutionality of the order argued as much in their complaint, and have won an injunction blocking its implementation.”
On January 20, the same day Trump issued an executive order on free speech, the president also issued an executive order titled “Reevaluating and Realigning United States Foreign Aid,” which froze funding for programs run by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Among those were programs designed to empower civil society and human rights groups, journalists and others responding to digital repression and Internet shutdowns.
According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), this includes many freedom technologies that use cryptography, fight censorship, protect freedom of speech, privacy and anonymity for millions of people around the world.
“While the State Department has issued some limited waivers, so far those waivers do not seem to cover the open source internet freedom technologies,” the EFF wrote about the USAID disruptions. “As a result, many of these projects have to stop or severely curtail their work, lay off talented workers, and stop or slow further development.”
On March 14, the president signed another executive order that effectively gutted the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM), which oversees or funds media outlets including Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Voice of America (VOA). The USAGM also oversees Radio Free Asia, which supporters say has been one of the most reliable tools used by the government to combat Chinese propaganda.
But this week, U.S. District Court Judge Royce Lamberth, a Reagan appointee, temporarily blocked USAGM’s closure by the administration.
“RFE/RL has, for decades, operated as one of the organizations that Congress has statutorily designated to carry out this policy,” Lamberth wrote in a 10-page opinion. “The leadership of USAGM cannot, with one sentence of reasoning offering virtually no explanation, force RFE/RL to shut down — even if the President has told them to do so.”
FREEDOM OF RELIGION
The Trump administration rescinded a decades-old policy that instructed officers not to take immigration enforcement actions in or near “sensitive” or “protected” places, such as churches, schools, and hospitals.
That directive was immediately challenged in a case brought by a group of Quakers, Baptists and Sikhs, who argued the policy reversal was keeping people from attending services for fear of being arrested on civil immigration violations. On Feb. 24, a federal judge agreed and blocked ICE agents from entering churches or targeting migrants nearby.
The president’s executive order allegedly addressing antisemitism came with a fact sheet that described college campuses as “infested” with “terrorists” and “jihadists.” Multiple faith groups expressed alarm over the order, saying it attempts to weaponize antisemitism and promote “dehumanizing anti-immigrant policies.”
The president also announced the creation of a “Task Force to Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias,” to be led by Attorney General Pam Bondi. Never mind that Christianity is easily the largest faith in America and that Christians are well-represented in Congress.
The Rev. Paul Brandeis Raushenbush, a Baptist minister and head of the progressive Interfaith Alliance, issued a statement accusing Trump of hypocrisy in claiming to champion religion by creating the task force.
“From allowing immigration raids in churches, to targeting faith-based charities, to suppressing religious diversity, the Trump Administration’s aggressive government overreach is infringing on religious freedom in a way we haven’t seen for generations,” Raushenbush said.
A statement from Americans United for Separation of Church and State said the task force could lead to religious persecution of those with other faiths.
“Rather than protecting religious beliefs, this task force will misuse religious freedom to justify bigotry, discrimination, and the subversion of our civil rights laws,” said Rachel Laser, the group’s president and CEO.
Where is President Trump going with all these blatant attacks on the First Amendment? The president has made no secret of his affection for autocratic leaders and “strongmen” around the world, and he is particularly enamored with Hungary’s far-right Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who has visited Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort twice in the past year.
A March 15 essay in The Atlantic by Hungarian investigative journalist András Pethő recounts how Orbán rose to power by consolidating control over the courts, and by building his own media universe while simultaneously placing a stranglehold on the independent press.
“As I watch from afar what’s happening to the free press in the United States during the first weeks of Trump’s second presidency — the verbal bullying, the legal harassment, the buckling by media owners in the face of threats — it all looks very familiar,” Pethő wrote. “The MAGA authorities have learned Orbán’s lessons well.”
“Let not any one pacify his conscience by the delusion that he can do no harm if he takes no part, and forms no opinion. Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing. He is not a good man who, without a protest, allows wrong to be committed in his name, and with the means which he helps to supply, because he will not trouble himself to use his mind on the subject.” — John Stuart Mill, 1867
If people can’t understand that things like rule of law and government stability are inherently related to security, I don’t know what they’re doing reading a blog about security in the first place. If people can’t understand that there’s a connection between what the Trump administration is doing and the foreign information operations against the US public for the past few decades, it’s clear that they have not been reading this blog at all.
All these “Ew politics I’m leaving!” posts seem a little performative, that’s all I’m saying.
In defense of Brian’s article this blog is a unique example of free speech. This article in not political. The Trump administration’s repeated assaults on the First Amendment reflect a broader strategy of eroding democratic norms through intimidation, disinformation, and authoritarian posturing. From branding the press as the “enemy of the people” to encouraging violence against protestors, from stoking religious favoritism to suppressing dissent through legal and extralegal means, these actions systematically chip away at the foundational freedoms that sustain a functioning democracy. This is especially alarming in the realm of cyber journalism, where exposing cyber crimes, digital corruption, and online disinformation depends entirely on the very freedoms under attack. This blog is dedicated to uncovering these issues and represents the ultimate form of free speech—one that thrives on the ability to report without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal suppression. When a government seeks to delegitimize the press, criminalize dissent, and control narratives, it doesn’t just silence critics; it creates a chilling effect that threatens the free flow of information, particularly in the digital space, where investigative journalists, whistleblowers, and independent watchdogs play a crucial role in accountability. If these attacks succeed, it won’t just undermine constitutional rights—it will embolden those who exploit the digital space for unchecked power, corruption, and manipulation, making the work of exposing cyber crimes more difficult and dangerous than ever. Brian is reporting evidence that should be of concern to all citizens.
Great factual article, Brain. Thank you. We IT professionals also have a private life, family and friends and therefore also have opinions about what’s going on in this country or anywhere else for that matter. We are still humans and not AI generated people. I learned years ago that the ones who profess to be apolitical are usually the ones situated on the right political spectrum. One can clearly see that from some of the comments here. Let them go. The rest of us are still going to read your well-researched writings.
Brian: thanks for putting this together. It is a great resource that I will share with friends.
were so fried as a country lmao
I don’t know how we can take four years of this and survive. I feel gutted.
People who don’t like politics mixing in their interests might want to step back and look at what is happening to the US military.
Mr. Krebs,
I have enjoyed your newsletter for many years because of the insights to CyberSecurity issues that you are uniquely qualified to bring to the public, and particularly to those of us who are guarding the data for both private and public enterprises.
Having said that, I really don’t appreciate your diatribe into political issues that I have seen in issues of late. I have noticed that many of your comments do not tell the whole story and are misleading. Is the focus of your newsletter going to continue in this vein, or are you going to refocus on Cybersecurity issues. If is the latter, great. but if it is the former, I don’t feel I need to subscribe going forward.
Respectfully
Jay Jordan, IT & Cybersecurity Consultant
Hi Jay. Instead of just labeling this post as political, how about telling us what parts of this story (assuming you read it) are misleading?
Mr. Jordan,
I would like to encourage you to keep reading and keep pointing out where information is biased. I believe Mr. Krebs expresses genuine grief, implication of which he has previously described in some of his recent articles concerning specific cybersecurity events. I tend to read then articles such as this as an instance of showing consequences of regulatory decisions, intended or not, as they play out in the cyber security arena.
To deny yourself that point of view, especially if you find yourself disagreeing, will probably not be beneficial.
Respectfully,
Christian Schein, Cybersecurity Incident First Responder
Hi Jay,
I think we should adjust your job title a little so it’s more accurate. First, let’s delete all the characters between the first and last characters. Now, we’ll add dio in between those two characters.
Much better:
Jay Jordan, Idiot
Good Luck! – ”Taken” the movie
Grow up
Brian –
thanks for this excellent compilation of information. Everyone that has a platform should be using it to point out the problems we are currently facing. I appreciate you doing this!
Wow. I’m not surprised to read this. Your left leaning journalist basis has been showing for some time now. Please return to writing interesting non-political stories on things you know about and where you can at least try to be objective. This is the problem with journalists they think they are so important and know more than everyone else. You don’t. Go write for Mother Jones if this is what you want to write on.
Labeling content left or right isn’t particularly fruitful in a conversation. People tend to retreat to their corners. Comments that add perspective can enlighten everyone. I for one appreciate a well-articulated difference of opinion, especially when it doesn’t align with my existing thinking.
Apart from Ad Hominem attack on Brian, do you have any factual thing to say?
Is he wrong in what he is writing or you can’t handle opinions that differ from your own?
Very sad, I do not remember one word being written about Nina Jankowicz here
Very 1984 indeed
“Trump sued Meta, and after the president’s victory in 2024 Meta settled and agreed to pay Trump $25 million: $22 million would go to his presidential library…”.
That’s a helluva lot of crayons and magic markers!
Thank you, Brian, for compiling this list of frightening but accurate actions by the Trump administration. I, too, am very worried about the future of our country. I have 9 grandchildren, and don’t want them growing up afraid to speak their minds, choose their religion (or none at all), or get justice under the legal system. Cybersecurity isn’t the only security we depend on.
Everyone with a Security Clearance knows that cell phones are trivial to compromise by State Intelligence services and hence never should have classified information on or pass through them. There is no such thing as a secure cell phone. The most frightening thing about the Signal debacle is that the folks involved ignored that basic tenant, even the participant who was in Moscow at the time of their participation.
In the list of Federal acronyms, ‘DOE’, is the Department of Energy. The official acronym for what is called the ‘Department of Education’ is ‘ED’. Everybody is getting that WRONG.
Thank you, Brian Krebs, for speaking up in the face of Trump’s unprecedented attacks on the U.S. Constitution.
People often look back on the rise of Nazism in Germany and ask why more people did not speak up, why effective action against the movement was not taken, how people allowed things to get so bad. This is why it is so important, a moral imperative, for you to use your platform here to speak up to protect the values of the United States.
In just two months, we have watched as our nation has fallen into shocking lawlessness. Men have been grabbed from their homes and taken to a prison in a third nation, with absolutely no Due Process. The US is paying El Salvador to imprison alleged Venezuelan gang members, supposedly for life, in a prison that violates all Human Rights – stacked 80 to a cell, no sunlight or outdoors, all with absolutely no Due Process. Then we have Kristi Noem, Secretary of Homeland Security, posing for photos with the prisoners caged in the background — looking very much like prisoners in old photos of the Holocaust.
Just the past week or so has seen horrorific violations of Human Rights — the married Gonzalez couple, who had been in the US for many years, had good jobs, have a lovely family, never involved in anything illegal — and yet were put in chains and treated like animals and deported. This does not in any way help the U.S. We see a Filipino lady who has been in the US for 50 years, working in medicine, never did anything illegal — yet, has been detained by ICE and is awaiting deportation. We have seen medical doctors, researchers, PhDs, and high level students, having Visas and Green Cards revoked, and facing deportation.
This seems very much like the Trump administration is purging intellectuals, which is one of the Hallmark actions of most dictatorships,
To make matters worse, Trump has allowed Elon Musk’s group, DOGE, to decimate government agencies that were established and funded legally by Congress.
Is the U.S. beset by a coup? Is our nation in great peril? Is our democracy being systematically thwarted and destroyed? Obviously, yes to all this.
Thank you for speaking up. Thank you for letting me speak up. I appreciate it.
We have a translucent thin-skinned “leader” in office that has stacked the deck against fair and rightful criticism. He is a pathetic coward in the face of objective truth and those who see and hear him for who he really is.
As Bernie Sanders said, if you can’t stand criticism then get the hell out of politics. It is no place for easily hurt children.
Nice work, please don’t get discouraged by those with no courage.
I understand the need to talk politics. Whatever side of any political fight you see yourself on there is an urge to use the soapbox to express opinions. I don’t however read Krebs for political commentary whether on “my side” or touting the issues of “their side”. I really hate how our country is disintegrating by infusing politics in literally everything and how people are so willing and motivated to throw their business and reputation into any political ring. Quick example; look at what Bud Light did to themselves. Even if 100% successful, what would it have accomplished? If it was 50% successful you just traded one group of satisfied return customers for a group of new customers who may or may not like your product in a year. And why in the H should my political leanings have anything to do with what brand of beer I buy?
Yeah, why would a journalist feel compelled to write an article about the executive branch illegally working to infringe the free speech rights on which journalists rely? Weird…
TLDR; anything in the article that would effect literally anything ever posted on krebsonsecurity.com?
His reporting on the whole Signal issue? Are you suggesting that Trump would not have had that article scrubbed, either by threatening the hosting provider for krebsonsecurity.com, or by having FBI agents come talk to Brian?
And if you think that’s an artificial idea, there’s no point in discussing this further (or at least until you stop using Fox as your sole source of news).
Bud Light didn’t do anything political. One group of customers didn’t like another group of customers for some reason and got mad at Bud Light for acknowledging them.
I’m out.. My efforts to avoid the hate and rhetoric (lets be honest, on both sides) are futile. Just when you think you are safe by being subscribed to a Cybersecurity news page.. here comes the politics.
This used to be a fact based intelligent and meaningful source of information. Unfortunately, it has followed the many other opinionated MSM sources and devolved into the typical “I’m not getting my way so I’m going to use my platform”, outlets. I’m saddened :(.. respect gone.
I see you can’t quote anything in the article that was not factual and are relying on “trust me bro” as your source of this devolution.
Anyone that doesn’t think politics has anything to do with cybersecurity isn’t paying attention to all the cybersecurity agencies and initiatives getting defunded. Hell we already lost one of the ISACs and CISA is getting the buzzsaw!
Sorry Joe, I’ll not be lowering myself to the politically motivated hate you seem to be pushing me towards. I’m going to stick to the purpose I stated in my comments, that I used to have a lot of respect for the technical skill and insight of a fantastic journalist.. and my change of heart due to the unnecessary and obvious one-sided political view written in the last few articles.
Politics has to do with politics.. Cybersecurity news can be written in a non-biased/non-political way if the journalist, especially one so very talented as Krebs has been in the past, if he so chooses.
Respectfully Jason, you have to realize the world doesn’t always have to meet you where you currently are. You may have become accustomed to algorithms giving you only good news but the facts do not care.
Clearly your political biases cloud your ability to see what is. This current administration is endangering America from every angle: politically, economically, socially and YES — even from a cybersecurity perspective.
You are entitled to your opinion but your perspective is uninformed. Cybersecurity has impacts borne out of politics and we must address these facts or we may not have such freedoms in the future. We do live in a free country and if you value that — you’ll also stand up to tyranny.
<>
Your security will be next!
For those who put their beliefs before analyzing the facts behind the reporting, I found this a few years ago (and forgive my lack of citing the source, it was lost): “The operative word here is “believe,” for as soon as the question is about conviction of faith the human mind will be immune to facts. The brain actively resists information that does not fit the story of the operating belief system, and stores contrary information in a way that does not change the system.”
Brian has referenced sources. Thank you Brian.
For those crying they’re out because of the politics feel free to leave the Cybersecurity world behind as well if you’re in the industry because the foundation of your ethics, or lack thereof, aren’t to be trusted. Why should anyone trust an engineer, sysadmin, analyst, or management who believes in the actions taken that are written about here or other media outlets like Wired?
I’m assuming those uncomfortable with reality would have gladly put their head in the sand like IBM did in the 1930s to sell tabulating machines that eventually were used to identify individuals for extermination because it was just ‘politics’ at the time.
Many of you would be wise to sit up and pay attention. Attacks on the Constitution and law will have and are having widespread effect on cybersecurity. DHS cuts affecting CIS, MS-ISAC and EI-ISAC whether side effects of ham handed cost savings or whether the destruction of these programs is the actual point makes no difference to the outcome. Foreign actors, independant and state, along with increasing incidents of hacktivism will continue to rise as the mechanisms to deal with these get torn down.
Before you dismiss these accounts as biased political speech, read again, fact check if you must, and look at the bigger picture. It’s not a matter of if these changes will affect you, but when.
Hi Brian, I am a longtime subscriber, not 100% sure but may have been from when you started this blog. I am not an IT person, just a regular retired citizen concerned with the security of my computer and myself, and few resource$ to fix problems. With your (unknowing) help, I have successfully kept my system free of the many threats that I saw others fall prey to because they did not update the software that made their systems run safely, or even educate themselves on basic security protocols.
I am glad you wrote this comprehensive report on the biggest threat to our democracy AND security. All I can say is – other than a hearty Thank You – I hope that more Americans begin to wake up and pay attention to the danger we are all in (all of US), as we are the only ones that can save our democracy. But we’re running out of time. It is time to put partisanship aside and work together to preserve the freedom of us all.
I’m only posting to contribute to balancing the absurd complaints about this being biased and partisan. While it’s clearly opposed to the actions being listed, the article is extremely fact-dense and opinion-light.
People need to be able to consider beyond whatever their personal perceived benefits might be, to the remarkable potential for harm and abuse when you assemble all of these various efforts into a greater picture. It should be alarming for anyone who respects the ideals in the US constitution. Even ignoring the moral aspect, from a purely practical perspective, it threatens the security and stability that enable us to prosper.
I appreciate your concerns for the US. I expect it to get much worse before we get a new leader (or whatever).
It is due time the government burns to the ground. So it can be rebuilt better, hopefully with less ego, financial stupidity and greed.
The coming global war between China, Russia, NK, and EU, US, UK will be nasty and cost half the lives on the planet. Hopefully the species will learn from it, so it’s not like that for 100 years.
Whose fault is it? – everyone, for letting government get to big, and being the teat everyone sucks dry.
I’d like to just blame trump, but it’s not that easy – he is the product of this countries bitching.
surprised and pleased to read Brian’s commentary, however difficult to digest
Thanks you for documenting these lawless actions and putting them in an organized framework. Cybersecurity is a subset of the security provided by the rule of law and your documentation of the lawlessness of our current leaders is definitely relevant.
To all the “why the politics?” complainers, this isn’t about politics, we’re living in a world of “post politics” in this country, it’s a case of one wanting to protect what’s left of our civil liberties or being pro-Trump, there is no middle ground here and no place to hide by pretending it’s “political”. Interestingly, none of the the complainers that I’ve read actually debate any of the points raised by Krebs. Why is that?
Nice work Brian!
Now do the Democrat Party and their 50 year war against he 2nd Amendment