Engineering Trust in a Divided Digital World

This essay is part of both Toward a Trusted Tech Alliance and Made in Democracy, twin series exploring how free nations can build a Trusted Tech Alliance and ensure the systems connecting our world are designed for freedom, not control.

The Moment We Learned What Really Runs the World

Years ago, I toured a quiet aerospace factory in Southern California where America’s unmanned aircraft take shape. I expected the clang of metal and the hiss of hydraulics. Instead, there was only the low, steady hum of servers and cooling fans. Every wing section, camera pod, and flight-control surface was linked to a shared digital backbone.

As I walked the floor, it struck me that if that network stopped, so would everything else. What once depended on engines and rivets now depended on code. We used to measure strength in steel and fuel; today it runs on compute and connectivity—on the trustworthiness of the circuits that move our economies and defend our freedom.

In the industrial age, nations measured security by how much oil or steel they controlled.
In the digital age, they measure it by how much compute and connectivity they can trust.

Every modern system—defense, finance, energy, and even diplomacy—now runs on interlinked hardware and software whose supply chains span rival jurisdictions. A single microchip, encryption library, or firmware update can be a vector of influence—or interruption.
Dependence and deterrence now run on the same circuit.

Engineering Freedom into Connection

Democracies can’t retreat from the world. Their strength has always come from openness—sharing ideas, innovation, and talent across borders.
But connection without control breeds vulnerability.

We must follow a simple framework for balancing openness and security: Secure at the Core. Resilient at the Edge.

These two design rules define the architecture of trusted interdependence—a world open by choice, not by coercion.

Secure at the Core

Being secure at the core means that the heart of a system—where data are processed and commands executed—relies only on verified, trusted components and code.
It is not isolationism; it is freedom of action by design.

That requires:

• Trusted compute: No unverified chips in command or AI-training clusters.
• Sovereign software: Code compiled and signed in reliable jurisdictions.
• Cryptographic attestation: Every update validated end to end.
• Quantum-safe communications: Secrets today remain secrets tomorrow.

We learned from 5G that whoever controls the update channel controls the system.
A democracy’s digital infrastructure—civilian or military—cannot rest on blind faith in unseen firmware.

Controlling What We Create

Securing the core also means managing how technology diffuses.
The chips, algorithms, and compute capacity that power progress are dual-use—capable of fueling discovery or domination.

That’s why export controls are not instruments of isolation; they’re instruments of integrity.
They define the outer boundary of trust, ensuring that democratic innovation does not accelerate coercive power abroad.
Disciplined openness is the essence of security: sharing freely within trusted networks, and drawing firm lines where technology could be weaponized against our values.

Openness without oversight is naïve; restriction without reason is self-defeating.
The art of trust lies in knowing where to draw the line.

Resilient at the Edge

Even with a secure core, disruption will come.
Suppliers will falter, adversaries will probe, and code will fail.
Resilience at the edge ensures that open systems bend without breaking.

It means:

• Multi-source supply chains for chips, minerals, and cloud regions.
• Mapping not only your suppliers, but your suppliers’ suppliers.
• Networks designed to fail-operate rather than fail-safe.
• Reciprocal interoperability so allies can substitute instantly in crisis.

Resilience turns interdependence from a liability into a shared shield.

Guarding the Physical Frontier

Every connected device—crane, car, camera, or thermostat—extends the digital frontier into the physical world.
The Internet of Things has become the Internet of Control.

If those systems are designed, updated, or hosted from untrusted jurisdictions, they can become latent weapons: cranes that won’t lift, cars that won’t brake, power grids that flicker on command.
And as artificial intelligence begins to operate these systems autonomously—what some call Physical AI—the risk expands from data privacy to physical safety and sovereignty.

Resilience at the edge now demands verified sovereignty of control.
Open societies must know, quite literally, who holds the remote.

Trust as Architecture

When secure cores meet resilient edges, they form a trusted stack—open inside, disciplined at the boundary.
It’s the digital manifestation of what I call a Club for Good: a network of nations and firms that share access only when they share accountability.

The payoff is not just protection but performance.
Trusted systems deploy faster, share data more freely, and scale innovation across allied markets.
In a world where time to compute equals time to decide, trust becomes the decisive edge.

Engineering the Blueprint

1. Map the Exposure. Audit chips, firmware, hosting, and AI dependencies.
2. Design Dual Assurance. Pair every critical system with both a trusted core and a resilient fallback.
3. Certify Through Allied Standards. Treat software bill of materials (SBOMs), code-signing, and data-sovereignty seals as passports for participation.
4. Invest in Allied Redundancy. Finance duplicate critical nodes through allied development finance institutions and export promotion agencies.
5. Educate for Trust Engineering. Train a generation fluent not only in code efficiency but in governance by design.

From Dependence to Deterrence

Authoritarian powers weaponize dependence; democracies must wield trust as deterrence.
A secure core denies coercion.
A resilient edge denies collapse.
Together they ensure that freedom’s systems can fight through friction and recover from shock.

The Call to Design

Every AI model, semiconductor supply chain, and connected machine now sits on the frontlines of strategic competition.
We can keep patching vulnerabilities—or we can engineer trust from the start.

The next era of peace and prosperity will belong to those who do both:

Secure where they decide. Resilient where they connect.

Because the frontline of freedom is no longer defined by borders or bases.
It runs through the circuits, sensors, and systems that connect our world—and through the trust that keeps them free.

In line with my belief that embracing AI is essential to both personal and national success, this piece was developed with the support of AI tools, though all arguments and conclusions are my own.