PerspectiveRussian Hackers Attacked Me and Other Military Spouses. Why Can’t We Sue?
In a systematic campaign aiming to sow panic and confusion, Russian government hackers, masquerading as ISIS fighters, have been hacking computers and smartphones of spouses of U.S. military personnel, stealing and distributing their personal and financial information, and spreading lies about the on the dark web. “Almost as astonishing as the discovery that Russia was behind the attacks was finding out that U.S. citizens have no legal recourse against foreign governments that target them online,” writes Lorri Volkman, whose husband serves in the military, and was attacked by Russian hackers four years ago.
Lorri Volkman was sitting in her home office near Vancouver, Wash., four years ago when she noticed that she’d been tagged in a Twitter post. The sender identified himself as “CyberCaliphate,” and the photo showed a head and face tightly wrapped in the kind of black and white fabric she’d seen in news reports about the Islamic State. “Lori Volkman! You think you are safe but the IS is already here, #CyberCaliphate got into your PC and smartphone.” Next came a private Facebook message from someone with the same frightening image.
I was a military spouse with young children, and my husband was not home. Four other military spouses, she soon learned, had been threatened with the same messages,
Volkman writes in the Washington Post:
it turned out that in this case, the enemy wasn’t the Islamic State — it was Russia. The Associated Press found evidence in 2018 that the Russians hackers who interfered with the 2016 presidential election were connected to CyberCaliphate and — ever intent on destabilizing the United States — had used the Islamic State cover to sow the idea that Islamist militants were ready to inflict violence across the country.
The threatening messages weren’t the only way the hackers went after me and the other military spouses. A reporter told me that our email addresses and actual emails were published on the dark web. My computer has experienced multiple “remote access” security breaches, and I have had trouble with my financial accounts since then.
Almost as astonishing as the discovery that Russia was behind the attacks was finding out that U.S. citizens have no legal recourse against foreign governments that target them online. The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act — written in the pre-Internet days of 1976 — shields these bad actors from being sued by private citizens.
