Intelligence in the Cyber Era: Evolution or Revolution?

The emergence of global hyperconnectivity through computer networks has occasioned much marvel, reflection, and commentary on its implications for everything from "just-in-time" supply chain management to the Internet of Things. These developments are also consequential in national security and intelligence. What must objectively be seen as technological progress has also sparked debates that would have been unimaginable half a century ago, and in fields far beyond computer and political sciences. The desire to protect informational assets from theft, subversion, and degradation and questions about how to exploit networked computing for strategic gain have spurred remarkable developments in intelligence collection, policy, doctrine, law, strategy, and even ethical norms. There are active debates about how cyber considerations affect each field touched by them, and it seems that there remain more unsettled than settled questions about cyber power as a lever of statecraft in the twenty-first century.