While America Watched the Border, the Cyber Front Exploded

As 2025 closes, Americans can take a breath. The economy is stabilizing. Borders are finally being enforced. Foreign adversaries are once again being reminded—without apology—that American strength still matters. President Trump has done what many in the permanent political class insisted could not be done: restore a sense of direction, leverage, and consequence to governance.

But while Washington focused on walls, tariffs, and treaties, another war expanded quietly beneath our feet. It didn’t involve tanks or troops. There were no cable-news countdowns or presidential addresses. It unfolded silently, invisibly, and relentlessly—through emails, servers, smartphones, and cloud infrastructure. And most Americans never saw it coming.

Cybersecurity stopped being a technical issue in 2025 and became a psychological one.

The most effective cyber-attacks of the past year didn’t rely on elite hacking skills or exotic malware. They relied on fear. One of the most widespread scams circulating this year centered around claims that a user’s search requests and webcam footage were accessed and then leveraged as part of an extortion email. It didn’t prove anything. It didn’t need to. It simply accused, threatened, and demanded payment. And thousands of Americans complied, not because the claim was true, but because panic works faster than logic.

That was the lesson of 2025. Cybercrime isn’t just about breaking systems anymore. It’s about........

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