Study Says US Cyber Ability Is Years Ahead of China

(ConservativeHub.com) – China has been working on a plan for decades to replace the United States as the leading global power by the centennial anniversary of China’s Communist Revolution in 2049. Chinese officials have doubled those efforts under the reign of President Xi Jinping. However, despite their best attempts, it appears that China still lags behind the US when it comes to technology.

The International Institute for Strategic Studies, a British think tank, published a research paper on national power and cyber capabilities on Monday, June 28. It determined that China’s cyber ability is a decade behind that of the United States.

The US has the advantage of being the global first mover, having invested earlier and more heavily than China and Russia in the underpinnings of cyber power.

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Intended for use by national governments to assess and calculate “strategic risk” and appropriate countermeasures, the study assessed the cyber capabilities of 15 countries. Then, it assigned each nation to one of three tiers for consideration.

The first tier designees demonstrate “world-leading strengths” in all the categories assessed by the study group. The second tier includes countries demonstrating strengths in some categories. The final tier includes countries with some strengths or potential in some areas but “significant weaknesses in others.”

The United States was the only country included in the first tier. China fell in the second tier along with Russia and five other nations. Iran and North Korth Korea fell in the final tier level with five other countries.

While the report is good news for the US, it also raises questions about our ability to maintain superiority in the coming years. On the plus side, President Joe Biden has kept Trump administration tariffs against Chinese companies and imposed sanctions against several Chinese supercomputing companies. His administration has also initiated a ban on Chinese firms producing and deploying surveillance technologies against Muslim minorities.