The North Alabama International Trade Association (NAITA) hosted a Q&A event called “Weaponizing Cyber: How China, Russia & Other Nation States Are Undermining Our Democracy & National Security” at UAH’s Invention to Innovation Center (I2C) as part of its roundtable series celebrating NAITA’s 40th year.

Dr. Micheal Klipstein and Elisa Chestler answered questions from moderator Lee Smith, all of whom are from Baker Donelson, a law firm. Klipstein is a strategic advisor of Baker Donelson’s D.C. office, primarily handling space, maritime and cybersecurity issues for the defense and commercial sectors.

Chestler is an attorney working in information management, health information and technology, healthcare regulatory issues, and corporate transactions. Smith is an attorney and leader of the firm’s Trade and National Security practice policy review and tabletop exercises to stress test existing policies and procedures for data protection, ensuring sensitive information is not shared via email, ensuring the cybersecurity of vendors, and monitoring the Dark Web for possible leaks.

“Both your competitors and foreign governments seek classified information as well as your intellectual property. Now with export controls and sanctions tightening around China and Russia … state actors or contractors done by these actors or just to run-of-the-mill criminal opportunists are working harder to steal what they are not otherwise allowed to get,” Klipstein said, explaining the importance of cybersecurity discussion and practices.

Cheslter said she primarily works out of the Nashville office because the data protection team she founded and chairs identified the Southeast as an area in need of more cybersecurity measures.

She shared a case she worked in Alabama for a small defense company that didn’t believe it would be a target for China until the FBI informed them that the Chinese had been in their system for six months.

“They’re not necessarily looking for you or you or you,” Chestler explained. “They’re looking for an open door, and they’re going to pivot off of you or you or you, right? So whoever they get to, they’re just pivoting. They’re looking for the deepest pocket. They’re looking for the best opportunity. They’re looking for the weakest link.”

Klipstein and Chestler explained that universities are often the softest targets for international cyber-attacks. Klipstein, who used to work in offensive cyber operations, said that when he had a foreign target, he would often start by breaching a foreign university.

“Take this university; it has a wildly fluctuating and dynamic student population. So people are always coming in, people are always leaving out, whether they graduate or leave doesn’t matter. Do you think that those admins are keeping up with every account creation and deletion? Second issue: information in the university is supposed to be free. It’s supposed to be for open and collaborative research. … So security controls are not always there,” said Klipstein.

Notable guests included members of the Swiss Aerospace Cluster and George Barber, the ambassador of Liechtenstein to the United States. The conversation between Klipstein, Cheslter, and Smith was followed by a presentation from Rainer Schenpfleitner, Director of Lichtenstein’s Office for Communication called “China’s Encounter with a Small State,” about a public administration case between China and Lichtenstein.

The Weaponizing Cyber roundtable was followed by a networking event. For more information, please visit www.naita.org.