Cyber-corporatism (by William Norman Grigg)

February 4, 2006

by William Norman Grigg

February 3, 2006

In recent years, the phrase " public-private partnership " has come into

vogue as a description of nominally private corporate concerns that

work intimately with the federal government. In such an arrangement,

which is often described as " corporatism, " government -- which has the

power to tax, regulate, subsidize, control, and ultimately to destroy

-- is invariably the senior partner. In Mussolini's Italy, such

" partnerships " were called " consortia, " and they provided the economic

foundation for the Fascist regime.

The ongoing " war on terrorism " has accelerated and amplified a

previously existing trend toward what could be called

" cyber-corporatism. " In-Q-tel, a " venture capitalist " outfit started

by the CIA in 1999 to " accelerate the development of commercial

technologies for intelligence gathering, " offers a good case in point.

On January 4, Amit Yoran, former chief of the National Cyber Security

Division at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), was appointed

CEO of In-Q-tel.

After graduating from West Point, Yoran was permitted by the Pentagon

to forgo his military service commitment in order to develop

cryptology and security technologies. Along with his brother Elad

(also a West Point grad), Yoran created Riptech Inc., a computer

security firm, in 1998, eventually selling it to Symantec for $145

million. His task at the DHS, he explained in an April 2005 interview

with CSO magazine, was to " build bridges to the private sector " by

establishing " interaction points of information-sharing " and " analysis

centers. " At the time he quit his DHS post, " We were working with some

36 associations and trade groups, with constituents representing

literally all the critical [information] infrastructure of the nation. "

As head of the CIA's taxpayer-subsidized venture capital company,

Yoran can continue that " bridge-building " effort as Washington works

to build its all-encompassing cyber-security web. The advertised

purpose of that web is to protect our nation from foreign

cyber-attacks. The flip side of that proposition, of course, is that

Washington will develop the means to track everything Americans do

while in cyberspace — for our own good, naturally.

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