TUESDAY, DECEMBER 4

The United States spends over $300 billion a year on basic research, making it a natural target for countries that seek to close a technology gap without having to invest time and money in R&D. Approximately 70 percent of the market value of a typical U.S. company resides in its intellectual property assets, such as trade secrets and R&D activities, both classified and unclassified. Yet most companies spend the lion’s share of their security budgets protecting the other 30 percent of their assets, such as physical property. Similarly, the sheer number and variety of threats to U.S. national security have stretched federal resources devoted to combating the foreign intelligence threat to these assets.