The Unbalanced Negative Externalities of Cybersecurity

**Executive summary:** Amit Mital (Symantec CTO) argues that the Internet would benefit from a public-health style approach to security — analogous to vaccinations and hygiene — to reduce millions of infected consumer PCs and botnets, and warns that the Internet of Things will magnify the problem; he proposes measures such as device hygiene certification, differentiated network access (quarantine or degraded service for unpatched devices), industry incentives, and potentially regulation as a last resort.