This post "The U.S. Is Under Attack" - Major Profits From Cybersecurity appeared first on Daily Reckoning.

?Frankly, the United States is under attack.?

That's Director of national intelligence Dan Coats' assessment to the Senate Intelligence Committee last month.

According to Coats, we're under threat of cyberattack from not just Russia and China, but Iran and North Korea, too.

Russia wants to subvert our democracy and undermine our society. A weak and divided opponent is easier to deal with.

China's not far behind, with dedicated cyberwarfare military units and a thirst for gaining access to the United States' deepest military technology? and with no compunction about also penetrating corporate networks and stealing trade secrets.

North Korea, ringed with sanctions, needs cash. It's turned to cryptocurrency heists to help make up the gap. Last year's WannaCry attack ? launched with malware designed to ransom computer data in exchange for bitcoins ? was likely a North Korean cyber op.

Cryptocurrency mining represents a juicy target for cyberattacks. Inserting malicious code that can harvest cryptocash from clock cycles is a way for cyberattackers to grab an instant payday from compromising your computer.

Our allies are also under the gun. British Parliament was subjected to a suspected Russian email cyberattack late last year. This week, Germany's foreign ministry computers came under a sustained attack.

But nation-state actors aren't the only thing Coats is worried about.

Terrorists, criminal organizations and lone wolf cybercriminals are all posing huge threats to our economy ? one that's heavily dependent on IT infrastructure and secure data.

As artificial intelligence, cloud computing, internet of things and other technologies grow, we're only going to become more dependent.

And that means more vulnerable.

Last week, web hosting company GitHub got hit with what's being called the largest distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack in history.

Flooding GitHub from many sources of garbage traffic, the cyberattackers used a new method to amplify the amount of wasted bandwidth. The amount of bandwidth was huge.

The motive remains unclear, however.

GitHub's no stranger to cyberattacks. In 2015, it suspected China attacked the company over hosting software designed to get around the country's internet censors.

GitHub was able to recover quickly, thanks to switching over to a third-party content delivery network to handle traffic.

But the company is looking into better automated interventions ? including enabling DDoS mitigation providers.

And they're not the only ones looking to stay one step ahead of hackers.

It's a target-rich environment for cybersecurity stocks, which are outperforming thanks to this ?digital cold war.?

Take Cisco Systems (NASDAQ: CSCO), for example. Over the past month the company's shares have risen from $38.78 to $43.73 as of early this morning.

An increase of over 12%

But they're not the only cybersecurity stock on this rise. The whole sector is seeing gains.

Take for instance the First Trust Nasdaq Cybersecurity ETF (NASDAQ: CIBR). This basket of big-name cybersecurity and related tech stocks is soaring right now.

Check out the one-month chart below:

Bottom line is if you're looking for fast gains in tech, you'll want to strongly consider adding a few cybersecurity positions to your holdings.

For Technology Profits Daily

Ray Blanco
Chief Technology Expert, Technology Profits Daily

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The post "The U.S. Is Under Attack" - Major Profits From Cybersecurity appeared first on Daily Reckoning.