This article discusses the Equifax breach in 2017, where Chinese intelligence officers took advantage of a security flaw and hacked into the Equifax system, gaining access to sensitive information, like social security numbers, etc, about millions of American people. This event details two things – one, following the discovery of this breach, there was a huge push for public policy related to data breaches and privacy and many government officials called for an “urgent need for comprehensive data security legislation”. Congressmen and women discussed how this breach could have been “entirely preventable” had Equifax taken the proper cybersecurity measures to protect their customers’ information.
On the other hand, this event brings to light the idea that non-state actors have less accountability because it is hard for them to be apprehended by the U.S. In this case, even though the identities of those involved in the attack were discovered and the U.S. indicted them with charges, the U.S. cannot arrest them and China will likely not arrest their own people for breaching an opponent’s network. In fact, American government officials acknowledged, in regards to the Equifax breach, that “there’s little chance [they] will be apprehended by U.S. officials any time soon” … “, but the charges put bad actors on notice and curtail their ability to live normal lives.”
