Contested Systems: Cyber, Geopolitics and Resilience across Government and Critical Infrastructure

On 4 June, ASPI and Cisco hosted a fireside conversation with Anne Neuberger, General Partner at Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and former Deputy Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor (2021-2025). Hosted by ASPI's Executive Director, Justin Bassi, the conversation explored cyber security and critical technologies, including the power of attributing cyber-attacks to deter future acts. Anne and Justin discussed how democracies should respond to threats against critical infrastructure – including prepositioning on critical infrastructure by state actors – and the game changing role of artificial intelligence for cyber offence and defence. Anne also outlined the strategic importance of governments and senior leaders publicly distinguishing democratic values from authoritarian objectives and why democracies needed to be the ones to set AI standards. The conversation canvassed other issues including strategic competition between the US and China on critical technologies and global AI adoption, the challenge of how AI can be used to strengthen cyber security and resilience, and lessons to be learned from our 5G and TikTok experiences.