{
  "id": 10389133,
  "title": "Who writes the code of the new world? - opinion",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/28/who-writes-the-code-of-the-new-world-opinion",
  "topic": "world",
  "section": "World",
  "published": "2026-09-28T07:18:53.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Jerusalem Post",
    "slug": "jerusalem-post",
    "url": "https://www.jpost.com/defense-and-tech/article-909926"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "Code has evolved from a hidden technical language to a governing force shaping modern systems, from financial institutions to intelligence platforms. In the 21st century, this shift has given rise to a critical security question: who writes, controls, and defines the values embedded in this code? While much of contemporary computing has its roots in American universities and defense programs, other nations have emerged as significant players. China has built a vast computational and industrial base. Israel boasts one of the world's most sophisticated centers of cybersecurity and defense technology. Iran, despite facing sanctions, possesses substantial indigenous cyber capabilities. Even isolated states like North Korea have demonstrated their ability to project cyber power globally. The strategic influence today hinges on software, data, and computational infrastructure, not just armies and territorial control. This highlights the reality that code has no ethnicity but carries embedded values and implications that differ across countries. The personnel behind the code, their institutional environment, and the environment they operate in determine its strategic significance, not the passport or ancestry of the individual. Modern geopolitical competition is increasingly a battle over technological architecture - semiconductor manufacturing, cloud control, satellite constellations, AI model training, and cryptographic keys. The 2026 Alliance Digital Strategy by NATO emphasizes secure digital infrastructure, AI, Zero Trust architecture, post-quantum cryptography, and human-machine collaboration as crucial elements of its defense posture. The strategic contest of the 21st century will be influenced by who can better collect, protect, interpret, and act on information faster and more securely than their adversaries. For open societies, this presents a paradox - innovation thrives on openness, international cooperation, and free talent movement, yet these same technologies can be dual-use. Artificial intelligence can detect cancer or enhance targeting systems; computer vision can verify citizens or enable mass surveillance; cryptography can protect a population or conceal hostile operations. The challenge for democratic states lies not in producing more technology, but in preserving openness while protecting critical systems. The threat is real, as evidenced by the US intelligence community's 2026 Annual Threat Assessment, which identifies China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, and non-state ransomware actors as persistent risks seeking access to American networks for espionage, disruption, or profit. Similarly, North Korea's cyber program is described as sophisticated and agile, with funding for weapons development derived from cryptocurrency theft. Iranian cyber capabilities pose an ongoing concern alongside Iran's missile and drone programs. These American assessments underscore the significance of treating software supply chains, AI systems, and telecommunications infrastructure as strategic assets rather than mere commercial products. A small group of programmers can now create effects previously achievable only by conventional military means, altering the dynamics of international security. Israel exemplifies a defensive strategy that treats cybersecurity as an extension of national infrastructure, recognizing its role in energy, finance, biometric identity, space systems, and civilian resilience. This boundary between digital security and national security is dissolving in technologically advanced states, with energy, finance, biometric identity, space systems, and civilian resilience all becoming intertwined with cybersecurity. This boundary extension even reaches into space, where software written in one country can govern satellites operating over other continents, giving remote strategic reach through code and imposing consequences for any failure or malicious instruction within autonomous, nuclear-warning, or space-control systems. The emerging Western approach is not merely about creating more code but about ensuring trusted code - systems that are auditable, have secure development environments, verified supply chains, incorporate Zero Trust infrastructure, maintain human oversight of consequential AI decisions, engage in continuous red-teaming, and share intelligence among allies. NATO's digital strategy aligns with this approach. However, the balance is challenging - too little oversight can invite exploitation by hostile actors, while excessive oversight could hinder innovation and technological progress.",
  "summary": "Software has quietly become strategic terrain. The question is no longer who can write it, but who can be trusted to govern it.",
  "key_points": [
    "Code has shifted from technical language to governing modern systems across various sectors.",
    "Nations like China, Israel, Iran, and North Korea possess significant cyber capabilities."
  ],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}