Cass Sunstein Quotes

After the horrific attacks of September 11th, it was evident that our Government needed to be transformed to meet the new challenges of this dangerous world.

This century is going to be a very dangerous century.

You can’t prepare for the best case; you have to prepare for the worst case.

With the evolution of information technology, there have emerged new questions, for example, of data and privacy.

In the area of robotics and in the area of connectivity, technology is offering us things that we are vulnerable to - and we have to have a better response than a shrug.

The concept of the "information society" is both vague and all-embracing. Different participants meant different things by it. In practice, though, World Summit on the Information Society only dealt with a small number of issues: ICTs and human rights (to some extent), ICTs and development (to some extent), infrastructure finance and Internet governance. Very large aspects of what might have been included in the "information society" were not really discussed.

We've spent the last 30 years focusing on the T in IT, and we'll spend the next 30 years focusing on the I.

Since 2001, people have been scared. There's been some really scary stuff that's been happening - 9/11, Iraq, Afghanistan, Katrina, anthrax letters, D.C. sniper, global warming, global financial meltdown, bird flu, swine flu, SARS. I think people really feel like the system's breaking down.

War zones are dangerous, protests can be violent, also, natural disasters are difficult to cover, so there are going to be risks.

I really believe that we don't have to make a trade-off between security and privacy. I think technology gives us the ability to have both.

Technology just means information technology.

The attacks of September 11 persuaded many Americans that what might seem to be obscure or distant potential threats can very quickly materialize and it therefore makes sense to attend to them even before they become urgent.

But I warn my colleagues that we will fail in our efforts to protect the homeland if we do not take additional steps to avoid a trade-off between protecting ourselves against terrorists attacks and preparing for and responding to natural disasters.

It is impossible to work in information technology without also engaging in social engineering.

If you look at the major industries of the future, IT and mobile are way up there.

Now is the era of intellect, information and the Internet.

I believe that people are too complacent about technology.

But it is equally incontrovertible that if our intelligence gathering process is seriously flawed, we had better find out and find out fast if we are to avoid another Sept. 11.

I understand that computers, which I once believed to be but a hermaphrodite typewriter-cum-filing cabinet, offer the cyber literate increased ability to communicate. I do not think this is altogether a bad thing, however it may appear on the surface.

We cannot stop natural disasters but we can arm ourselves with knowledge: so many lives wouldn't have to be lost if there was enough disaster preparedness.

I used to think that cyberspace was fifty years away. What I thought was fifty years away, was only ten years away. And what I thought was ten years away... it was already here. I just wasn't aware of it yet.

I think a lot of stuff like people's emails getting hacked or that an email you sent is stored on a hard drive somewhere, that kind of stuff worries me a little bit. It's a weird thought that someone else could get into my information that easily. That stuff's pretty scary.

The internet is an unforgiving place for yesterday's great idea.

The great lesson of 9/11 is that improper hoarding of information can cost lives and harm national security.

Technology will move faster than governments, so don't legislate before you understand the consequences.