Good morning. A very warm welcome to the IIE webinar on cybersecurity and EU strategic autonomy, coherence and capability challenges. This event is part of a transnational project with think tanks in the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, which is coordinated by the IIEA and supported by Google. My name is Joyce O'Connor, chair of the IIEA digital group and moderator of today's event. I'm absolutely delighted to welcome back to the IIEA our distinguished speaker, Professor Kieran Martin. You're very welcome, Kieran. I'm really pleased to see you again and thank you for taking the time out of your very busy schedule to be with us today. And we appreciate this very much indeed. And we look forward to your presentation. Kieran produced an excellent paper for the IIEA cybersecurity and European strategic autonomy, which is available on our website. He produced this in May this year. So in today's event, he'll present the key points from this paper, as well as talking about some recent developments since May in EU cybersecurity. He will conclude by talking about the choice facing Europe caught between two technospheres, the US and China, and Europe's own ambition to become a global digital power. Kieran will speak for approximately 20 to 25 minutes, and then I will go to your audience for Q&A. And as you know, the Q&A functions at the bottom of your screen. Please feel free to send in questions during Kieran's presentation as they occur to you and I'll come back to you once Kieran finishes his talk. As ever, today's presentation and Q&A is on the record. Please join our discussion if you want to on Twitter, the handle is at IIEA. Professor Kieran Martin is currently Professor of Practice Management of Public Organization at the Blavatnik School of Government and Oxford University. Prior to joining the School of Government and Oxford University, Kieran was founding chief executive of the use case National Cyber Security Centre, part of GCHQ. Professor Martin led a fundamental shift in the UK's approach to cyber security. He successfully advocates for a wholesale change of approach to cyber security towards a more interventionist posture. This approach was adopted by the UK government in the 2015 National Security Strategy, leading to the creation of the National Cyber Security Centre in 2016 under his leadership. In his 23 years career in the UK civil service, Professor Martin has held senior roles in the Cabinet Office, including Constitution Director and Director of Security and Intelligence in the Cabinet Office. His work has been recognised nationally and internationally, receiving awards and honours in the UK, the US and elsewhere. Kieran's knowledge of public finances, national and international security and central bureaucracy is a rare combination of expertise and experience. So Kieran, you have the floor now and we look forward to your presentation. Thank you so much Joyce, good morning everyone and thank you for joining me. Thanks to the IIEA for having me. I learned in my previous job in the UK government never to underestimate the IIEA. I recall a wonderful morning in Dublin in around 2018 where a small number of opinion formers had been gathered for a private round table on cyber security. And afterwards I'd agreed that there'll be a small event where I would do some public remarks on the record because and of course I was a serving senior member of the UK government at the time. So when the door opened to this small gathering which turned out to be 150 of some of the most influential people in Irish technology and other aspects of national life. So I was really somewhat shuddered and did a double take. I know there are many eminent people and a large number of people listening in, but this time hopefully I have learned my lesson about the IIEA's convening power on important subjects. So I was privileged to answer their request back in what became a publication in May for a contribution to a series of studies they were looking at on the EU and technology. And they asked me to write something on cyber security and European strategic autonomy. And I chose to focus on two issues one is the coherence of the EU's approach to cyber, and the other is the influence between that and capabilities. Through two quite different contestable to just my opinion, you may not share it and we that can come out in questions. But I hope reasonably significant conclusions. One is around the coherence of the EU's efforts on cyber security in the midst of a bunch of harms that can happen as a result of malevolent cyber activity from hostile powers criminals and a range of other people. The conclusion of coherence is that there is a technocratic question for the EU and its member states about at what level does it want to do cyber security. What does it want to leave to member states and what does it want to in effect federalize that is a fixable technocratic challenge but it needs answering because otherwise if you do it unconsciously. This is one of my view suboptimal outcomes and I'll say a little bit about how that choice manifests what sort of harms it's trying to counter, but additionally, where it has somewhat stumbled into so far into quite a messy alignment between allocation of responsibilities between member states and central EU wide authorities. So that's the coherence point how do you configure if you like the capabilities 27 member states and a unifying central set of institutions to do cyber security. And what does that tell you about the strategic autonomy. Then you get into the much more important question and much more difficult question in my view which is about capabilities and in essence the quite provocative question. What form of autonomy ultimately can Europe have when you're basically using other people's technology. There is some indigenous technology in Europe in the European Union in the UK in the continent of Europe, but we are as Joyce said now sandwiched increasingly between two technospheres a US led block and a Chinese block. As Friday evening, I was talking to a former digital minister of a smaller EU member state who was talking about the EU's ambition to be a global leader in the regulation of AI. My simple rhetorical challenges. How far can you be a leader in anything by being a leader in its regulation but not in its development and what are the implications of that for Europe. I'll take those two and turn with some reflections on each and trying to weave in where I can significant events since May whether they do or don't promote the general thesis I'm imply I'm advocating. So first, let's go to coherence and if as if you're in my position in the period sort of 2014 to 2020 when I set up and led UK's National Cyber Security Center. It was a somewhat odd position from which to watch developments in the EU cybersecurity given the UK's initially full participation then half membership in the departure lounge and eventual departure at the beginning of 2020. That in some respects give me quite a valuable perspective on the way that the EU was developing on it. And one thing I would say around cybersecurity influence globally is that national capabilities give you a ticket and not having those national capabilities don't. So, if you like, in operational cybersecurity between governments, Europe, the most important mechanisms in Europe are largely private, not talked about much. They're largely voluntary and they're largely voluntarily multilateral. There are all sorts of little groups of institutional cooperation between the UK and CSC the French the Irish authorities and so forth, little mini groups and so forth. And often I'll come to this in a little part they're not highly dependent on the treaties of the European Union, because their national security organizations and therefore exempt. And as you might expect, in terms of national cybersecurity capabilities, three of the most powerful in this continent are Germany France and the United Kingdom. I start by this rather glorious incident in 2017 at the Estonian Digital Summit in Tallinn. Estonia as you may remember had an extended presidency because the UK post referendum give give up the six months. And we've had a very interesting discussion between me and my French and German counterparts around trilateral security cooperation between the three big powers. And I knew for full well this would happen. You know, I was not allowed on stage with them because of the UK's position vis-à-vis the rest of the European Union at the time. So I happily embraced the role of bad smell at the conference, at least in public, and the French and German, my French and German counterparts went on stage together and what followed was extraordinary. I had been talking privately with my German counterpart, Arna Schoenbaum, the head of an organization called the BSI, who was scathing about the EU's latest national mandates for its member states on cybersecurity, because essentially in the words of a member of an academic from the University of Levain, Germany was being required by Alexander Samojenk is the name of the academic Germany was being required to replace a more advanced cybersecurity strategy with a less advanced one if it took the commission's regulations. And seriously, the commission's ambition was to level up to use a British politics phrase at national cyber capabilities. But in doing so was actually constraining what Germany which had been doing this to a high degree of capability for years was being was being asked to do. And I sort of said you're not going to say any of this on stage are you and he said all of it on stage and actually led a denunciation of if you like Europeanization of cybersecurity at the expense of some of the more capable member member states. And this I think is a really interesting illustration of the problem. You've dealt with cybersecurity as I have for many years and you look from a nation state perspective at the sort of threats, what you have ranges from profound matters of national security, often, if not covert, reasonably classified, requiring high end national security capabilities, some of which will be secret, often an intelligence or Department of Defense type of context, all the way through to criminals hacking bits of data of commercial companies in a very obvious and open and open way. And therein lies the challenge of doing cybersecurity at EU level. Because part of this, and nations like France feel extremely strongly about this as perhaps, surprisingly to some of you do Germany has shown by the talent anecdote. And they engage profound matters of national sovereignty, which they will be very reluctant to get away very reluctant to share. On the other hand, the other end data breaches etc etc. And of course Europe has been a world leader in data regulation for good or ill with the general data protection regulation of 2018, all the way through to matters of digital trade which lend themselves very obviously to leadership at EU level. So if you're worried about Russian state espionage and national parliaments, which is a has been a consistent problem across all areas of the European Union for many years. Most countries will default to doing that at nation state level. If you're worried about an apparent French, apparent attack all by Russia on a French TV station in 2015. The instinct will be to deal with that at member state level. And even that specific example France takes a very different approach to the issue of attribution the public accusing of a hostile power of malevolent cyber activity France doesn't do it as the Baltics do the Scandinavians do. So the significant, if you like tensions and differences of approach between them, but they'll want this, the national freedom the autonomy to do that themselves. On the other hand, in the digital single market, how can you regulate against data breaches, how can you put together different approaches, you'll want something unified. Now there have been some significant development at EU wide level something called the news directive and they're now two of them network information systems has some harmonized approaches for the regulation of critical national infrastructure across across the Union. Increasingly, and there's something called door of the digital operational resilience act has harmonized expectations for cyber resilience amongst big financial institutions. But again, to go back to the German criticism of this. What cannot be ignored is the variance national capabilities. Now one of the difficulties in cybersecurity is actually assessing how good people's capabilities are and there are various organizations that try to do league tables of international capability and cybersecurity and they're but the international telecommunications union is one of the more respected and authoritative lists. And what's interesting is that of the top 20 ranked countries in the world and the most recent index in 2027 are in the EU is Tony Spain, Lithuania, France, Luxembourg, Germany and Portugal. And nine are outside the top 40, and a further six are outside the top 50. And it tends to be the further north you go. The more capable it becomes, sadly I'm afraid to say the exception in the last ranking is Ireland, which, which placed them 54th of the government since the HSE hack has placed significant investment and reforms and we'll see how that goes. So what you have is if you like a central, the central European functions increasingly putting in place e wide regulations on this, but in very, very different national capabilities needed to make them a reality. So in other words, one of the risks is that they're not sophisticated enough for Germany which is frankly incentivized as its head said in 2018 to do its own thing. And perhaps the two challenging for some of those lower down the scale, and maybe they're aimed at those and bringing them up to a basic minimum standard. One of the two discussions that I think that one of the two discussions that you will need to have more strategically is which parts of this do you genuinely believe are best left to national authorities, because there is an element of this, just as there is in defense, where countries will be more and more and send will be incentivized to do at least some of their own thing. There are parts of this that are very obviously around the digital market where it'll end itself to regulations, but how do you then make sure that you're not penalizing those who've got a head built good digital defences good ecosystems for digital defences and so forth. And the second challenge is what you do at a wide level. There are bodies in the Athens based cybersecurity agency which sets sort of regulatory standards. And there is something called a search computer emergency response team which is increasingly under international practice, a required function for every nation state to have in the US has one. There's an intelligence center set up by the external action service, but relative for example, to a France to Germany to a UK, they're very small organizations in terms of personnel and and and expertise. So what is if you like the balance between eyes and stomach of the EU, in terms of its capabilities and how does that relate to member states. Now so far, I'm actually going to because that sort of brings me to the end of the first question on coherence, if you like, and if you like national capabilities. And so far, you know apologies if you find it rather boring. And the reason to say that is that everything I've said so far is I think makes for an interesting technocratic discussion about some fixable problems. I don't think there's anything than what I've said that is an extremely sort of cumbersome intellectually difficult long term policy challenge. There's a bunch of choices, and then investment and reforms and institutions and practices arising from those choices. But there's nothing that complicated about deciding on the right balance and the your and the EU institutions and culture to do this and all the topics for decades now about finding the right way of configuring a bunch of capabilities regulations and relationships about how to do this. And you can take your own view as to how that should be done. But alternative capabilities of a different sort and by this I mean in a sense the building and operating of technology. And this is where I think Europe has got a has got a much more fundamental problem. And by this I will probably lazily and unintentionally interchange the European continent, including for example the UK, and Switzerland and others, and the European Union because frankly, I think whilst the solutions may be different because of the usability to act at 27 and other countries, not having that ability, but the problem is actually the same. The fundamental problem is that the tech revolution has been driven by people and institutions and companies that aren't here that are not in this continent, whether in the EU or out of it. So the top 20 tech companies by market cap in 2020 10 were American five were Chinese and the remaining three were Japanese Korean or Taiwanese, that is should no surprise to anybody. Major part of the technological market by my reckoning, where your place is significant role is the highly faltering telecoms infrastructure market where the two Scandinavian giants of Nokia and Ericsson are globally strategically important companies that register in the Beijing, their fate for good oil matters. We saw that with the 5G controversy. The mismanagement globally of the telecoms infrastructure market over recent years has been really really striking. And these companies are there but they are the exception in the paper. For example, I've given a separate analysis of national security requirements in the UK and France and how they relate to data hosted in the US. So, essentially, for purposes, principally but not confined to counter terrorism, the ability to analyze data on suspicious activity is hugely constrained by US law, and ultimately because of the headquarter location of a lot of these companies, American law, the special protections for US citizens for communications, transiting in and out of the US, which basically all communications do have placed great constraints on the sovereignty and strategic autonomy of other countries. We have contrasted the contrasting fortunes of the UK and France in seeking an effect and negotiated arrangement for special access to data held by US companies, known as the Cloud Act. The UK has achieved one the French have not. That's not to say that there's something special about the UK's position, although as a five eyes partner, it does give the UK both access to greater security data and indeed some more leverage in discussions in Washington. But the fact is you have two other permanent members of the Security Council who are both nuclear powers, in effect having to go and beg the US Congress for access to data that they didn't vital for national security. That's not strategic autonomy for either country. But that's the way of the world. You will think back to the outrage in many parts of Europe, particularly in Germany after the Snowden leaks, and lots of talk then about in effect trying to make sure that the way Europe used the internet did not lend itself to such things in future. That talk lasted a few months before dissipated on the grounds that the technology is not there. There is no possible viable way of doing this. Now that doesn't leave Europe powerless. It is half a billion in the EU it is nearly half a billion by global standards wealthy internet users. So there is mileage in being a regulatory superpower. The EU has shown that in data. It has enacted one of the most forward leaning and indeed might be absolutely welcome in terms of global cybersecurity set of regulations on the Internet of Things in the world. And this is really important stuff. Essentially, one of the big problems in cybersecurity has been the exploitation of intrinsically weaker technology to give you an example. There's a major attack which affected Twitter and Amazon host of other household names on the East Coast of the US in 2016 and the way it was done was hijacked a bunch hundreds of thousands of CCTV cameras and just pointed them at what's called a DNS provider. Essentially think of the phone book of the internet took it down. So all this traffic on Twitter and Amazon didn't know where didn't know where to go. And so essentially the services collapsed. And the way those CCTV cameras were hacked was that they were the default password on them was password. And even if you notice that the technology that cameras were built so you couldn't change it under the EU regulations that is now illegal to sell such stuff that's really pioneering and really good stuff so there is agency for Europe in being a regulatory superpower but it only in my view takes you so far. And this is where you're going in effect, as per this so called cloud act where you're in effect, I'm a supplicant to, you know, to US led sphere. But more importantly, I think you're beginning to detect in the transatlantic tech dialogue. There's potential change in US attitudes and I'll just, I'll come to that in a minute. We can talk a bit more in the Q&A about, you know, the sorts of threats we're trying to encounter, we're trying to counter. And there are all sorts of criminal threats are, you know, as everyone in Ireland knows from the health health services executive outrage last year, there's a problem with Russian organized criminality. There's malevolent North Korean activity against financial institutions, there's lots of Iranian spying and so forth. But the two most common threat actors we talk about the Russian state and the Chinese and the Chinese state. But here I need to bring attention to an important difference between Russia and China. And I said this many times before the war showed up some of Russia's perhaps limitations as a as an aggressor, but it holds even more true now. When it comes to our technological ecosystem, it is now very fashionable but no less true for that to say that when it comes to our sort of digital security Russia is severe bad weather, but China is climate change. And this matters, because in a sense what Russia does is cheats on America's internet. Okay, so it's, it doesn't have anything of its own. It, it spies, it disrupts, it hacks into essentially technology built by the US and its allies. So your job there as a defender is to try to reduce the number of times are successful and reduce the impact when they are successful. So it's conceptually easy operation it's very, very difficult to the first part of the conversation. And it can be, it can be very difficult and it requires lots of careful organization and so forth but conceptually it's quite simple. China is now completely different it does all of that stuff that Russia does it spies, it steal stuff, etc, etc. And it also has now built an alternative set of technology that work differently they lend themselves much more to state control. They have gigantic companies that can do all the data processing they can do all the infrastructure, and so on. And there is now if you like a, some people use the phrase tech Cold War. It's not a phrase I particularly like but I can't think of an alternative other than these two technospheres. They're now in effect around the world, including as we saw over 5G and a con in Europe a contest between the US led block and the Chinese led block for supremacy. Now, in that scenario, my judgment is that Europe will default to the US led block, but rhetorically, and I stress rhetorically, there's a lot of talk in Europe about why are we in this position, and shouldn't we have our own strategic autonomy so we can take our own decisions. And I'm afraid the answer to that at the moment, by and large is no, other than in some aspects of regulatory policy and a few bits of telecoms infrastructure, because the capabilities aren't there. So in a sense, one of the things I noticed in the regulatory discussions is a sense on the US side that look, whatever you whether you like Facebook or not, some most people don't whether you like various other US tech giants. The beast, if you like, is, is not US tech. Based with the choice between a US led tech model and a Chinese led tech model, it is obviously more closely in line with the EU's values and Europe's values as a whole to go with the US model. And what choice do we have if we don't have anything of our own being being built in that. So I think that's something for Europe to watch in future the limitations of being a regulatory superpower, but also frankly the importance of thinking about what is built and run and operated from within the continent itself, and it gets very very hard. It also, and I think the US are finding this themselves. It is, and it is a hard set of policies and practices to get right in liberal market democracies. I mean the Biden administration and I just passed an extraordinary piece of legislation which includes all of the following three things one is $52 billion worth of subsidies for the US domestic industry. Secondly, a bunch of sanctions on Chinese companies in terms of using US IP and so forth. Many people have likened it to a race where the US are both trying to run faster and slow the competitor down. But most extraordinarily, a set of possible sanctions on US companies and companies trading in the US I lots of European companies, if they do any business in China or with these Chinese companies so there you can see this bifurcation, this bifurcation happening. And that that act has passed since I wrote the paper. So just to conclude because I know we're coming to the end of of time, I think there is a sort of technocratic problem or challenge, but it's fixable within Europe which is faced with a bunch of malevolent cyber threats which I think is the war in Ukraine as shown are more if you like chronic catastrophic we're not talking about, you know, digital Armageddon we're not talking about cyber power harbors we're talking about the persistent pernicious loss of data we're talking about more instance like the HSE in Ireland, where you have massive and sometimes physically dangerous social and economic disruption.  We've got that challenge that can be that can be solved, but the greater long term challenges there is a race on for mastery of the technologies of the future between the US and China. There's a third block of advanced mass market digital users who don't have the indigenous infrastructure to compete there are largely using laws and regulation to maintain a voice and changing that in terms of planning, organizing markets, cooperating across national barriers, balancing economics and security, balancing the short and the long term is finally difficult challenge, but any meaningful discussion of European strategic autonomy and cyberspace has to grasp that it's not something that can be solved by strategy documents it's something that requires profound discussions about national sovereignty about European integration, but also frankly, and how Europe interacts as a block with the rest of the world. So I'll stop there Joyce I hope that's given you some food for thought and very keen to move to the Q&A. Very much here on it definitely has given us food for thought, and maybe a warning shot across our bows and it certainly wasn't boring at all. I must say you've raised many issues and challenges, but very clearly set the scene, if you like, of what the challenges are. You know, I'm very pleased to see that you're optimistic that we can look at particularly the challenge of working together on the more chronic issues but the future issue really is the race on mastery of the future of technologies and how that's going to make sense. So, thank you very much for that and we might start with the first question, because you said that the EU must make a choice, either to seriously commit to a technological industry policy to achieve a strategic autonomy or else pursue closer cooperation with the US. So what happens if the EU fails to make a choice between these possibilities for the divergences between member states and what possibility is likely to occur by default. So I think, I mean just my view and it's a prediction, therefore caveat supply. I think not taking a choice defaults over time into closer dependence on the US. I think we've seen that over various issues in the past, and I can't see certainly with geopolitics the way they are. Too many people trying to do what we did maybe 10 years ago and balance the US and China against each other. And then I think the second order effect of that is over time, probably not through any specific incident landmark incident but over time they use regulatory power diminishes on the grounds that you know eventually the US strategically says well what are actually going to do instead. You know if we don't like the burdens that you're putting on essentially US technology and US companies then what are you going to do about it. So that would be my prediction on that from us. You know currently that you know you mentioned it about the US trade and technology council. How do you think and that it is more optimistic and there seems to be more kind of effort to get things going but it is still at that superficial level. Have those profound discussions taken place. Not my knowledge. So, I think there are. There are two sets of nascent dialogues going on in the world around. So if you take for example if you go back to the G seven declaration and 2021 and Cornwall. It's actually a really really interesting declaration signed by the leaders including EU leaders who were there around recognizing the fact that, as I said in the presentation for the first time there is a. There is a competent competitor to the US led tech model and there's no such thing as sort of borderless technology anymore essentially what it says. And that if you want to protect free and open classically liberal technology have to basically work harder and coordinate it better. So there are two sets of activities going on through that. One is if you like an informal G seven there was talk of something called a D 10 in other words the G seven plus India Singapore, Korea, South Korea, I think, you know talking about this the problem is they don't have the infrastructure to move markets and what happens after this, you go back to your national capital and you do what exactly, given that you're talking about the organization of technological markets. So they, so they get they are sort of more nimble than if you like a US EU structure, but they don't have the infrastructure to do anything. I forgot the exact opposite problem. You know they have the infrastructure and the ability to talk to each other they have close on a billion citizens between them of some of the richest and technologically advanced people in the world. But the mechanisms are incredibly cumbersome and the trade offs are massive. You know we all know I mean, these are sort of you know, turbo charge version of trade talks, we all know how difficult those can be the sexual interest that they engage, etc, etc. In the EU, I mean if you look at one of the, you know, both the EU and US the reason we're in such a mess on telecoms is the way that I think free markets find it hard to regulate for long term security and sort of strategic stability. So 20 years ago, the EU was the world leader and essentially in commercial telecommunications, all the big sort of you know telco providers so many of them were in Europe Europe was consolidating. The way regulation has been done through nobody's fault, it was well intended but the way regulation has been done in the past 20 years has contributed to breaking that model, because the whole point has been about within the EU, it's been about making sure that it's lowest possible consumer prices and no roaming charges between member states is essentially being the bedrock of European telco regulations the last 20 years. That's left no room to build up if you like strategic capability to look at these in the way that China does a strategic national assets that need to be nurtured. Again, how do you get that that sort of dialogue, changing that within the EU itself is hard enough, trying to do that between the EU and the US is going to be really really hard. But that's probably the only area of, if you like, Western life, where you have the institutional framework and you have the commercial power. And that is where I think the best hope lies of doing this but I think involves Europe first of all making that choice as to what extent it's seeking to pursue genuine strategic autonomy as opposed to regulatory autonomy which is not the same thing. And what sort of deal does it intend to strike with the US if it becomes available. Yeah, there's a lot on because in a sense if you look at the overall commission and the digital agenda, it is in fact, kind of there to promote small and medium size companies and larger companies to develop that technological competence, particularly in the selected areas you mentioned of Internet of Things, you know, AI, blockchain and other areas. But why is it in your opinion that Europe has failed to be a world leader despite its vision, its focus, its emphasis in producing digital technology in the same way as the US and China. China has it has has greater capabilities in terms of the state's intervention, but why is it because that is a very key ambition. And is it realistic. So the honest answer is I don't know. I think. So it's partly that scale really matters. It should weren't so, but you know you saw this if you take the big data giants on the west coast of the US and product giants in Apple and so forth. They're there they they scale up, they gobble up competitors, etc. And they're very hard now to, to, to break for whatever reason it has become much harder to build scale players in European Union and in the UK. There's a whole bunch of reasons in terms of you know the ecosystem of Silicon Valley and so forth that got a look, I suppose, at what gave the US its unique, unique advantage. China of course, a lot of not all of it is state is state planning the first phase of Chinese technological development was actually, I suppose if you like in the post done reforms entrepreneurial phase of it but since you know certainly in 2015 a lot of it is nice state planning and long term, long term execution of that plan in the way that you know the EU and indeed the US find extremely difficult given the profoundly different systems of government. And I do think that one potential reason I don't think it's the only reason or possibly even the primary reason, because I'm not trying to get all sorts of you know, free market idea log on you. But I do think that when it comes to regulation. And again it's contestable I'm not an EU expert, but it does seem that when it comes to tech, you know, the, the regulatory focus is understandably, but perhaps not always advisably just almost exclusively focused on the consumer. You know, the price, the safety aspects on all of which are absolutely have to be part of it. But what about the long term sustainability the scalability if you like. Yeah, of a particular product because if you're, you know, if, if you're coming out of the EU and that's your home market, and you have to pay attention to all of these things. You know, if you like feature of the regulatory system that allows you just to really really develop and scale up and then there's somebody else in the US you can just do it and then export to Europe on a much bigger scale. There is, there is, there is something in that I think. I think there's also something around. You know, whilst again, there are all sorts of aspects of the US ecosystem that are very much just originate entirely in the private sector. There's a massive amount of both spin off research from, you know, the humus that well also the US, the Pentagon and so forth, and all that. And also frankly, you know, very, very large scale research programs funded by the US government on a scale that, you know, Europe because it does a member state level will never will never match. And then, you know, at the level what sort of huge research programs might you think about and how and again what's the deal there between the central EU mechanisms as a whole and member states about where the fruits of that of that research go etc etc. I think there are there is a scale really really matters in this business. And it's proved harder to scale in Europe. It matters, not only in that development of it, but also in the support systems, as you say, like the universities, the investment research and all of that area, which, you know, that just hasn't had that quantum investment like in the US. But just staying on on this issue about investing seriously in techno industry policy, Seamus Allen from the IAEA asked the question if you're Europe did choose to invest. And in a way I'm wondering are you saying, you know, how can we but you can answer that in a techno industry policy to significantly develop this digital sovereignty. What steps should Europe take to ensure it is successful, or to compete with the US and China. And so I think I think there are a number of things one is the one is a serious sort of research strategy and capability around that. And the second and also, you know, picking those right technologies and so on to research and invest in a second part of that is then, you know, and this, this, this risk sounding a little bit protectionist although I think it is actually commuter with what's happening in the US and the UK is actually talking about the sort of rules and procedures flow from that in terms of what you're allowed to do with that research, you know, keeping it in, in, in, in Europe and so forth. A third is already mentioned is making sure that the regulation of the use of these technologies is mindful to the long term that you're not just squeezing costs down as low as possible to consumers. This means that, you know, they will be out invested by American competitors.  I mean, you know, we talk about the virtual world, but actually this takes up a huge amount of physical resources and needs physical presence for large scale manufacturing of various things. Well, you know, where in the EU might that be. And that's obviously a very difficult decision. It's a difficult, even within a nation state never mind a multinational union. They're all there. There are a whole bunch of things I think that you're to be optimistic because you did say in your question Joyce, you know, is it even possible I think it is possible. It's not quick. It's not quick. I mean, look how long it's taken China with all the China there are many disadvantages to the Chinese system but it has some advantages such as scale deep pockets and not having to worry about the view of electors. But, and even then, you know, their development has taken has taken a long time. But I think if there is the sort of candid realization of what is of what is needed it is possible to do this over years. There's a bunch of technology you kind of forget about that you should forget about.  If you like, you know, the US and China already dominant in that next generation telcos I think Europe actually could get its act together because of some of the advantages and then you know there are all sorts of all the things. There are all sorts of other areas of emerging technology where Europe could, you know, if it gets back together in time and be competitive in the long run. Yeah, thanks very much for that. I think there's a question from Karen Fitzgerald security and defence research at the IEA. To what extent could we potentially see cyber attacks on member states national grid infrastructure this winter by Russia. And how can member states prepare, prepare for the risk of cyber attacks. And is there a role that you can play in helping member states respond and deter against the risk of cyber attacks. I think that's a question, Karen. I think it does give me an opportunity to say a little bit more than I did about, you know, what the war has meant for cyber security. So I think there are several things to say one is, Russia is one of a small number of states that does have the capability to strike things like power grids. And I think there's a question to see, you know, cyber risks as being sort of all consuming and that, you know, teenagers in their bedrooms kind of sophisticated code enough to bring down power stations actually it's much harder than that. And only a few countries can only a few actors, all of whom are nation states can probably do it Russia is is one of them. And indeed it did do it in Kiev in 2015 and 2016. But it's not magic.  The two attacks on Kiev took 18 and 31 months respectively from conception to execution. The sophisticated attacks are comparatively rare. That said, as HSE showed him, and indeed a similar case in the US were just sort of low sophistication hack of a net of companies, corporate systems took out a pipeline in the US, not because they took out the pipeline but because the company couldn't organize itself to run the pipeline so the company closed it down so there is that potential for disruption. And I wanted to spread alarm, because when Russian invaded Ukraine, there was an awful lot of fear that things like this would happen in the West, to a great extent, none of them have. Why is that we will probably never know and it will be studied for years among cyber sort of scholars, but I think part of it is that it does seem that you know the cyber dimension of Russia's campaign. It's directed against Ukraine, rather than against the West. Some of it was well organized, some of it was just as badly organized as the rest of Russia's invasion campaign but what seems to be an explicitly absent is a direct provocation of the West. So, and I think this vindicates a long hell of you among some cybersecurity specialists that we tend to think of cyber as a sort of special enclosed domain where it has its own rules. It's true. Put it this way if you know, the power to this webinar went down and Oxford where I'm speaking to you from came under sort of cyber attack of an unprecedented sophisticated nature and the electricity supply to the city of Oxford was was wiped out. We probably know reasonably swiftly that it was the Russian state, and a response would be required as if it was an accidental pouring over the troops of into the Baltics or another Salisbury horror type attack. You can't do a cyber attack. But most of the time anyway in a completely sorted reliable way that doesn't have consequences. So, you know, I don't, I think we should be vigilant but I don't want people to sort of panic and think that just because the war is going very badly that these sorts of large scale attacks are inevitable. In terms of in terms of preparation. There are two things one is that actually what the history of the criminal cyber crisis which led to the events in Ireland last year led to hospital disruption in France led to food retail disruption in Sweden also the pipeline problem in the US. The entry points were reasonably basic, you know, it may have been a good team on the job but they didn't have to work very hard so that's one thing. There's a lot that organizations can do to just plug some basic gaps. But the second thing particularly something like energy is about resilience, you know, and the ability to survive the loss of a network. The example I always use is the next time you get on a plane. Just think about the air traffic control system which is computerized. If you think about it, if I told you that in the event of the wholesale failure of the air traffic control systems it system, whether by design in other words a hack or by accident because computer networks feel by accident all the time. If I told you that in the event of the complete failure of the computer system of an air traffic control system, there was no backup. Would you get on the plane course you wouldn't. So should you run an energy, you know, a grid like that, of course you don't, etc, etc. So it's all about resilience and thinking about the loss of key networks. In terms of what can the EU do about it, I think one it's already done, one it's not in a position to do yet. So what's already done is it's regulated minimum standards and you know that's now moved from, as I said in the presentation, NIS 1 Network Information Systems Director to NIS 2. So it's better and more sophisticated thing it's not in a position to do yet and maybe never will be that's part of that choice is are there a set of EU capabilities that could be deployed to help us a sort of member state in distress to a point but not, you know, it's it's, it's certainly not sort of equivalent to what say the US military might be able to deploy to the US. Now maybe that's not where Europe ever wants to be. So I'm not saying it's an obvious choice it's just one of the questions from the first part of my presentation, and it comes to a wider point, which is for minds better than mine with greater knowledge and expertise you know to what extent does the you want to get involved in mutual basically what it is. And that you did raise that question, you know, about the discrepancies. So, you know, in a sense, is it that bringing together in the whole EU framework or, you know, can we learn from greater cybersecurity, the greater cybersecurity capabilities in Estonia or Spain. Is it possible to learn from that, or do we have to get together and start looking very seriously at an overall EU framework. So I think I mean certainly there's more potential to do that informal voluntary cooperation and quite a lot of it happens. And there are very, you know, capable countries in the European Union in cybersecurity. And actually, I think one of the things is that, you know, if you get into, you know, complicated military capabilities, and you look at cooperation and, you know, everybody in the EU knows this. Then, you know, it does lead to if you take France as the leading military power in the EU.  In terms of cyber defense cyber offense is a different matter, you know, the ability to hack other people in your national security interest, but in terms of cyber defense. It's kind of mostly pretty easy actually, you know, it doesn't lead to that sort of thing so that there is scope. If you like to think about aggregating capabilities and again it's a choice for the Union as to what extent wants to get involved in that. And it comes back to a lot of the problems in cybersecurity. There's nobody's fault there's no major sort of malevolence or negligent decision in the past. It's just it's a tricky subject that not a lot of people understand. And so, you know, so again, it's no coincidence that data has been the great sort of flagship of the regulatory intervention because you know everybody sort of gets the data economy now it's trade it's modern commerce so of course the government regulates it a part of this part of the single market but then you take sort of national defenses against known threats, and people think well that's about article four is to me you know better stay out of that, etc etc. But actually, you know there's a $200 billion global cybersecurity industry that's actually really open where you know proprietary information is relatively rare I mean sure in terms of you know techniques and stuff you can do but in terms of actually understanding the information people are sharing it in abundance.  It wasn't a particularly well developed network in my day maybe that's changed I haven't been tracking it, but there is definitely more that can be done without actually having to bother people with great institutional reforms new directives, new legislation in the European Parliament whatever it is. I think there is more. It's really dull, but it's quite worthy. It is but it may be dull but it does take a lot of attention when anything goes wrong. And just on that resilience and further cooperation and acts, what are your thoughts on the EU Cyber Resilience Act, which was prepared earlier this month. So, in so far as I've understand the detail, you know, it is a good thing. I like it in a number of ways. You can always pick holes and anything written by bureaucrats speak as a long time one. So, one of the things that's better in it than in some previous year regulation and cyber is a bit more about, you know, the regulation about comes very easy in cyberspace to regulate and in sort of corporate governance and cyber to regulate the inputs but it's kind of it's not a waste of time, particularly if nobody's doing anything, but it only takes you so far. You know, actually preventing things from happening. Sorry, not preventing things from happening, but one of that is actually saying this is the outcome that you need to stop from happening. You know how you get there needs to be more specific. There's more that in this in this in this piece of legislation. Again, I suppose, you know, to get a little bit philosophical, it's sort of interesting that, you know, the EU is more and more stepping into this with Cybersilience Act within his directives and so forth. Because a lot of that historically might have been seen to be, you know, member state competence. And so if that's the way the EU is going, then I suppose that's fine if the member states are happy. But then at some point and you know this is a discussion that needs to be had the sort of institutional capacity and operational capacity of the Union as a whole will need to advance commensurately because at the minute, you know all those organizations that I mentioned that I imagine very few people in the audience for good reason have heard of any society you since then and so forth, you know they're smaller than the comparative agencies in France Germany, probably Sweden and the Netherlands as well. You know, but if the if the way the EU is going regulatory terms is meaning that it's more sort of harmonized and unified, then presumably that has to change at some point. Yes. But in a sense, though, there, there's a movement you think towards a kind of a better approach to cybersecurity within the Union. I mean, I think that's what you're saying you see signs of that. I think that's right and I think also, you know, it's no coincidence that Dora has it's known the digital operation resilience cycle is basically about the financial sector it's no coincidence that you know a lot of this is happening at sector level that's good by the way that it's happening at sector level rather than just cyber in a box because at the end of the day, what matters is what happens in the in in sectors you know what works for cyber regulation and finance doesn't necessarily work in energy. It doesn't necessarily work in telecoms mean finances, payment systems, etc. energy, a lot of it's plant and securing those are completely different technology technical challenges, so regulation finally enough needs to be different as well. I think markets become more and more integrated within the Union, you know, common regulatory approach can can can be very useful. But then of course those are the places where the big systemic risks from nations from hostile nation state activity arise. And that's of course where particularly the bigger, more security conscious, more security capable EU member states will tend to have sovereign capabilities and they will rely on more than they rely on EU institutions. That's not an insurmountable challenge you can pick and mix a bit but I think it needs to be a more conscious part of the debate which is kind of why I thought that German intervention way back in 2017 was just so refreshing and so interesting. Yeah, I know it was very refreshing when I read paper because it literally opened the discussion and change the agenda completely really from there on. So I just got a question from donor or brother Khan, who's a member of the IAEA, and he's going back to the scaling up question, and he's asking, you know, is, is Airbus an example of the kind of scaling up possible in European technology based businesses. I mean, I'll be a bit wary because of one, you know, commenting on one company but sort of, I mean, to give the classic answer given I used to work in Whitehall and the UK government give the classics or Humphrey Apple the answer, yes, yes and no. So yes, in terms of, you know, the conscious effort to get capabilities from different countries, put it in an industry where scale matters and be competitive that way in a carefully managed strategic way so yes. Knowing that, I think, or, you know, I would qualify it a bit by saying, you know, the speed at which scaling up has to happen is probably a lot faster than it has been and say, you know, classic sort of aerospace and defense technologies, you know, the sort of innovation is, so it's probably a difference in pace, but you know, I would sort of look favorably on it as an example, particularly actually outside, you know, I'm not now talking about cybersecurity, I'm actually talking about, you know, just take some technologies, just take some key advanced technologies and look at it that way. You know, because the focus of this seminar has been the, the EU, this webinar has been the EU, you know, I'm not trying to adopt a sort of, you know, classic, you know, UK exceptionalist, you know, everything's right in the UK I mean the UK has got similarly actually, you know, relative to size the probably greater problem in terms of the quality of the research and innovation in the country, not then being measurably matched by, you know, economic, scalable economic activity in country afterwards. So, you know, it is a key issue. Absolutely key issue. You mentioned there and unfortunately this is the last question because time has beaten us, but you've mentioned a number of times, you know, new technologies. Do you have thoughts on the cybersecurity implications of emerging technologies, or is it that we have to really develop those become a world leader, at least in some of these are a combination of these new technologies. So, you know, computing AI, the metaverse, all of these things that are developing. Right, so this is a brilliant question to finish on and actually if I had my prepared presentation over again I'd work us in so thank you for that choice. So, first of all, I'm really optimistic in this front globally about the chance to fix insecure technology so I bang on these days about the digital environment that we all live and work in. And how it's full of pollutants and that's a legacy of when we built the first generation technology back in the 90s and 90s didn't think about it. So, at the moment we're just playing catch up and mitigation the whole time and there's no choice that's what we have to do, but as new technologies can come in, we can learn from that and fix them as they're coming in. You know, why aren't there driverless cars in the streets of Dublin because you don't know how to operate them safely enough yet the technologies there we've all seen on TV. So, there's the principle is that you, you know, you carefully look at the technology, partly through regulation but also through just the science and engineering of it you think that gives a safe enough etc etc. So that really really matters. And the big opportunity for us now with applied AI, and with quantum computing, you know quantum computing is terrifying unless you secure it. It's transformative if it's secure and it's terrifying and transformative if it's not secured. So quantum is actually a good example where, you know, possibly the limits of just being a regulatory superpower would matter, because you shouldn't, you know, the countries that are ahead in the quantum race are both ahead in quantum computing and quantum engineering but also quantum security because they know the stuff will just not work unless it's it's it's secure. So if then, you know, they use nowhere to be seen in something like quantum, or the UK is nowhere to be seen in quantum. Actually, how many people in the US and China are going to care about their regulatory approach. Because you either have it or you don't and you have this or you can have something else. So there's a really interesting aspect there where, you know, it's in the global and it's in the interest literally of our species to get security of this right. But the people who are actually building it, we'll have much greater, we'll have the first call on the way it's secured and so on. And we need to incentivize that and I'm actually quite hopeful that this is an area where we can really get it right. And that could be transformative for both for both, you know, our ability to harness new technology but to do it safely. Yeah, but Karen, our time is up and that's a very optimistic note to end on because I think you gave a tour de force in terms of raising the issues and looking and probably as you said, you know, food for thought around along all those issues they're going to remain, but there's optimism about resilience, you know, has been resilient, but also looking to the future with these emerging technologies. So thank you very much for that. I think we'd be thinking long after this of the issues you raise and appreciate it very much. And I'd like to thank our audience for their participation and for the your questions. And we look forward to seeing you at our next event. And to our team here at the IIEA, Roka Mulally and Eva Mulcahy on production and Andrew Gilmour's the Deputy Director of Research and Seamus Allen our digital policy researcher. But our big thanks is to you Karen for your time for the stimulation and for the passion that you have for the subject and the absolute overview of the key issues. So we look forward to see you again and perhaps we can bring you, we definitely have a big crowd, but come to the IIEA in Georgia Street now that we're getting back to near normal. And thank you very much again and goodbye. Thank you.


Income Tax 2022-2023, American Opportunity Credit, who is an eligible student. Let's do some wealth preservation with some tax preparation. Most of this information comes from Publication 970, Tax Benefits for Education, Tax Year 2022. You can find on the IRS website, irs.gov, irs.gov. Support Accounting Instruction by clicking the link below, giving you a free month membership to all of the content on our website, broken out by category, further broken out by course. Each course then organized in a logical, reasonable fashion, making it much more easy to find what you need than can be done on a YouTube page. We also include added resources such as Excel practice problems, PDF files, and more like QuickBooks backup files when applicable. So once again, click the link below for a free month membership to our website and all the content on it. Yeah, looking at the income tax formula, we're down here in the credit area at the bottom of the formula. Remembering the first half of the income tax formula is in essence an income statement, although a strange one. The bottom line being the taxable income similar to net income, the bottom line of a normal income statement. We take that taxable income to calculate the tax before credits and other taxes, not with one rate, but with a progressive tax system. We then apply the credits and other taxes like self-employment taxes. We then have the payments and the form of withholdings or estimated tax payments to get to the refund or tax due the bottom line. We also note credits are similar to deductions in that we like them both. But if we can get a dollar credit versus a dollar deduction, we typically want the dollar credit because we get the full benefit of the dollar oftentimes, as opposed to a deduction which only decreases or reduces the taxable income, the benefit being a function of what our tax rate is. Also, the refundable credits breaking them out between the non-refundable credits and the refundable credits, non-refundable credits not taking the tax liability below zero. The refundable credits do making the tax code being used for as a welfare program or benefit program in that instance as opposed to basically taxes by that point. Who is an eligible student to claim the American Opportunity Credit? The student for whom you pay qualified education expenses must be an eligible student. This is a student who meets all the following conditions. Note we're talking here specifically about the American Opportunity Credit, which is going to be the one that usually offers a bigger benefit but is more restrictive than the Lifetime Learning Credit. Therefore, if you don't qualify for the American Opportunity Credit, then you can default and see if you still qualify for the Lifetime Learning Credit. We'll talk about it more specifically in detail in future presentations. First one, the student didn't have expenses that were used to figure an American Opportunity Credit in any for earlier tax years. So that's for the student which could be claiming the credit on their parents' return as a dependent, for example, or possibly on their own return if they're not a dependent or some combination of the two within the four-year period. Meaning they might have been on their parents' return as a dependent or something like that and then filed their own return. No matter where the credit was claimed, it's tied to that student's expenses and you only have the four years to be claiming the American Opportunity Credit after which time you might be able to default to the Lifetime Learning. The second one looks similar but is different. The student hadn't completed the first four years of post-secondary education, generally freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior years of college before 2022. So when we think about college traditionally, we kind of pack it into that four-year timeframe of freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior years. But in practice, obviously many people might take longer times than that because you would think that would be like a full-time student type of scenario. Or sometimes in some cases people might do it in the shorter timeframe and you've got some kind of schools that are more vocational in structure that might not fit as neatly into this kind of threshold or scenario. But you've got to talk to the college in terms of what that means with regards to any particular institution because once you're past that threshold, then you would think that you're in something that's going to be like a master's or something like that, in which case it may not qualify for the American Opportunity Credit would be the general idea. But you could be in a situation, for example, where you're in like you took six years or something to complete the freshman, sophomore, junior and senior years because you're working or something like that and possibly you didn't take the credit for some prior year maybe because you got money from that was from grant money or something like that. You got you got tax benefit money through work or something like that. And therefore you hadn't done number one here and that you hadn't used your expenses for four years up even though you've been going to school to some degree for six years and you have not yet finished the freshman, sophomore, junior and senior years and you would still possibly be able to to claim the American Opportunity Credit and that situation. All right, so next one for at least one academic period beginning in 2022 or the first three months of 2023 if the qualified expenses were paid in 2022 the student was enrolled at least half time in a program leading to a degree certificate or other recognized educational credential. Let's break that one down for at least one academic period. So when we think about the academic periods usually, you know, that's going to be a trimester, semester or something like that. You've got to talk to the finance to the school to see what their academic periods are. They're going to have to line up to this language to some degree in order to be in compliance with these kind of things. Although there could be some variance there beginning in 2022. So in the tax year 2022 or the first three months of 2023 if the qualified expenses were paid in 2022. Why? Because we have that cutoff situation. You might have paid for it in 2022 for courses that don't start till 2023. So you've got that three month timeframe in that situation. The student was enrolled at least half time. So there's another key term that you're going to have to most likely talk to the institution, educational institution to say, what does half time mean to you in terms of the number of courses that need to be taken to be picking that up in a program leading to a degree certificate or other recognized educational credential. Usually that's what you're doing there at the school, getting some kind of degree or certificate. But you want to make sure that that is going to be fulfilled as well in terms of the purpose of the school. You're working towards that. All right, next one. The student hadn't been convicted of any felony, any federal or state felony for purposes of distributing a controlled substance as of the end of 2022. They kind of threw that one in there. It's kind of a random one, but there it is. All right, let's break them down. Completion of first four years. A student has completed the first four years of post second ed education. If the institution at which the student is enrolled awards the student four years of academic credit at that institution. Of course, work completed by the student before 2022. This student generally wouldn't be an eligible student for the purposes of the American opportunity credit. Now, for some schools, it's going to be structured. That's the way the school is traditionally structured in a college type of situation. Other schools might not be as formally structured in that kind of way, but they're going to have to comply to some degree to that structure because that's how the whole educational kind of system is basically set up. So you want to be talking to the institution if there's like confusion on exactly what that means with regards to that particular institution. So exception, any academic credit awarded solely on the basis of the student's performance on proficiency examinations is disregarded in determining whether the student has completed four years of post secondary education. So you could have some situations where they basically just based on their academics have have basically cleared a year or something like that. And you would think then that might limit their ability to take the credit versus other people because they're excelling and that shouldn't shouldn't be a detriment to be excelling, you would think. So you have an exception there, the general idea. But I think most people most likely are in a situation where it might take them longer because they're they're working part time or something like that. But in any case and rolled at least half time. So what does it mean to be enrolled at least half time? So a student was enrolled at least half time if the student was taking at least half the normal full time workload for his or her course of study. Now what does that mean? It is once again defined by the institution generally in terms of what it means to be a full time and half time. So so you can have to talk to the institution oftentimes the education, the college or whatever to to make sure you're in compliance with that. The students, the standard for what is half of the normal full time workload is determined by each eligible educational institution. However, the standard may not be lower than any of those established by the US Department of Education under Higher Education Act of 1965 example. So Mac graduated from high school in June 2021 in September. Mac enrolled in an undergraduate degree program at College U and attended full time for both the 2021 fall and 2022 spring semesters for the 2022 fall semester. Mac was enrolled less than half time because Mac was enrolled in an undergraduate degree program on at least a half time basis for at least one academic period that began in 2021 and at least one academic period that began in 2022. Mac is an eligible student for tax years 2021 and 2022, including the 2022 fall semester when Mac enrolled at at College U on less than a half time basis. All right, example number two, after taking classes at College V, a part time basis for a few years, Shelley became a full time student for the 2022 spring semester. College V classified Shelley as a second semester senior fourth year for the 2022 spring semester. And as a first year semester graduate student fifth year for now graduate students so after the fourth year of the traditional four year frame according to the school now fifth year for 2022 fall semester. So because College V didn't classify Shelley as having completed the first four years of post secondary education as of the beginning of 2022, Shelley is an eligible student for tax year 2022. Therefore, the qualified education expenses paid for the 2022 spring semester education for the semester and the 2022 fall semester are taken into account in figuring the American opportunity for 2022. Example three, during the 2021 fall semester Larry was a high school student who took classes on a half time basis at College X. Larry wasn't enrolled as part of a degree program at College X because College X only admits students to a degree program if they have a high school diploma or equivalent. So because Larry wasn't enrolled in a degree program at College X during 2021, Larry wasn't an eligible student for the tax year. So in other words he's taken a class possibly just to take the class but it's not going towards a degree or something like that is I believe the general idea. So example number four, the facts are the same as in example three, during 2022 spring semester Larry again attended College X. But not as a part of a degree program Larry graduated from high school out in June 2022. So for the 2022 fall semester Larry enrolled as a full time student in College X as part of a degree program and College X awarded Larry credit for the prior coursework at College X. Because Larry was enrolled in a degree program at College X for the 2022 fall term on at least a half time basis, Larry is an eligible student for all tax year 2022. Therefore the qualified education expenses paid for classes taken at College X during both the 2022 spring semester during which Larry wasn't enrolled in a degree program. And the 2022 fall semester are taken into account in figuring any American opportunity credit. Example five, D graduated from high school in June 2021. In January 2022 D enrolled in a one year post secondary certificate program on a full time basis to obtain certificate as a travel agent. So D completed the program in December 2022 and was awarded a certificate in January 2023 D enrolled in a one year post secondary certificate program on a full time basis to attain a certificate as a computer programmer. So D is an eligible student for both tax years 2022 and 2023 because the degree requirement, the work, the workload requirement and the year of study requirement for those years have been met. All right, let's take a look at a flow chart. Those are always great here. Who is an eligible student for the American opportunity credit.  So first, did the student complete the first four years of post secondary education before beginning before the beginning of the tax year. This is for the American opportunity credit, not the lifetime learning credit, which if you don't qualify for this one, you might be able to default to that one. So if the question is no, we move on. If yes, the student isn't an eligible student here, but maybe lifetime learning credit. So we're going to say no. Next one was the American opportunity credit claimed in at least four prior years for this student. So did they claim it for that particular student? I don't care where you claimed it was it claimed on your parents return on their return or whatever, but it was tied to that particular student. If the answer is yes, then no for the American opportunity, but possibly lifetime learning. If the answer is no, we move on. Was the student enrolled at least half time in a program leading to a degree certificate or other recognized educational credential for at least one academic period beginning in 2022 or the first three months of 2023 after qualified expenses were paid in 2022. So then if yes to that one, we finally go to the last item is the student free of any federal or state felony convictions for possessing or distributing a controlled substance as of the end of tax year 2000 of the tax year. We don't want you guys on the college campuses, you mess up all the college trying to learn over here.  So you have to pass that you can't do that can't be on that one. So then so so if you say yes is is the student free. Are you free of any felony conditions if the answer is yes, the student is an eligible student and then you can move from there to calculate the credit which we'll talk about in future presentations.


A fiery horse for the speed of light, a cloud of dust, and a hearty hyosilver, the Lone Ranger. During the years of unrest that followed the Civil War, a powerful secret organization called the Legion of the Black Arrows sprang up in the western United States. Its members were to be found everywhere, defying the law or using the law for their own purposes, working toward the ultimate goal of revolt and the foundation of a despotic empire. It was the masked rider of the plains who led the fight against this band of outlaws and traitors, and for once his great strength and courage, his daring and resourcefulness were taxed to the utmost in the cause of democracy. Return with us now to those thrilling days when the West was young. From out of the past come the thundering hoofbeats of the Great Horse Silver, the Lone Ranger rides again. After his attempt to kill the Lone Ranger in Tonto, Jebedire Leach tried to make his getaway across the Badlands. Desperately he spurred his mount, but the sound of the pursuit drew closer and closer, and as the trail disappeared and the ground became rocky and broken, he knew that escape was impossible. He tried to rain up, and only then did he realize that his bronco had taken the bit in his teeth and was running away. Oh, look, your maverick!  Oh, steady boy! Steady! Oh, it's no use. All I gotta do is hang on and hope he doesn't break your leg. Serves me right.  They're right behind me. My only chance is for them to catch up and stop this coyote before it...   I can't hold on much longer! Good boy, Silver. Stopped him right at the edge. There's a 30-foot drop there. He'd have gone right over. Well, Leach, this is the second time tonight you've asked for help. I meant it this time.  All right. I'm grateful. You can turn me over to Sheriff. I won't make any more trouble. We found that blasting counter back there in the cabin. You said this was only the beginning. I'm through. Who are you working for? Nobody. That isn't true. Masked man, I broke out of jail six months ago. I took this job to keep from going back. I failed. And I'm glad I failed. You can send me back where I belong, but I still want to live. You mean the man who hired you will see that you're killed if you talk? I'm sure of it. How much longer did you have to serve? Three years. It'll be 23 now. 23?  There's only one way you can get off of the lighter sentence. That's by telling us who hired you. I wasn't hired. Who forced you then? But if I do, if I mention his name...  What good will it do? It's only my word against his. He'll deny it. What's more, the jury will believe him and not me. I'm a jailbird. I got a record. You can leave the matter of proof to us. No, it's no use. I'll make another promise, Leech. We won't turn you over to the law until we have our proof against the other man. You mean that? You have my word. That's good enough for most people out here in the West. I guess it's good enough for me. Well? You'll have to travel beyond the past to find him. He's in Riverdale. His name? It's... It's Andrew Thompson. Andy Thompson? Kimosabi. Him government agent. You know him? I know he was sent out from Washington about three months ago. He has charge of the land office and he collects the taxes for the whole district. Yeah, that's right. And it was Andy Thompson who blackmailed you? See, I told you it wasn't any use. You don't even believe me yourself. We'll investigate your story, Leech. You're riding with us to Riverdale. No. If he sees you... He won't. Get your horse around. Now, come on.  The Lone Ranger, Tonto and Leech skirted the badlands to the south. They made camp the next night in the foothills and the following day it took them through the past in spite of the difficulties of a trail. There was no camp made that night. The moon was pulled and the trail led straight across the level plain. The night faded into mourning. The sun rose and an hour later, Leech began to recognize landmarks. You'll see the river when we get to the top of the next rise. The town's just beyond it. To the left. Into the woods. Get a boy! We make camp here. There's Tonto. They're clearing up ahead. That'll do. He'll get light pretty soon.  No, Kimosabe. You can help me with the disguise. I can't waste any time. Oh, boy. You stay here with Tonto until I get back, Leech. After that, we'll plan our first move. At 10 o'clock that morning, Sally Leonard, pretty, spirited in just 18, was arguing with a tax collector in the land office. The door opened and the stranger walked in. In the heat of the discussion, the girl paid no attention to him. I'll tell you, Mr. Thompson, we paid our taxes to a man named Leech over a month ago. Pardon me. Be with you in a minute, stranger. Leech never brought the money here, Sally. You admit you hired him to do the collecting? Of course I admitted. Well, where is he? Just let him deny we paid it, that's all. You aren't the only one who's been in here with a complaint. Must be 20 Leech got money from. Where is he? I don't know. Don't you understand, Sally? I believe you're telling the truth. But there's no record in this office to show you paid your taxes. Unless we can find Leech and get the money out of him, you just have to pay him again. We can't. And your ranch has got to be sold at public auction to the highest bidder. It ain't fair, Mr. Thompson. I'm not saying it is. But that's the law. You only got another week. Can't you and your pa raise the money someplace? I don't see how. There's a chance we'll get it back for you later on when they find Leech. It wouldn't be for long. Bank won't lend us any. Pa tried to borrow from improvements about two months ago. Well, this is private business. You just wait around a while and I'll talk to you some more later on. What can I do for you, stranger? I'm in no hurry. You must have heard what I just said to the girl. We aren't going to talk anymore till we're alone. Well, perhaps I shouldn't have come in here. The sheriff wasn't in his office, and after all, you are a government agent. What's that? Do you know of any outlaws around here? Outlaws? Three men camped out in the woods on the other side of the river. One of them's an Indian. One of the men wears a mask. An Indian and a mask man. What's the third one like? A man with a scar on his forehead. Leap and cactus. I thought the sheriff should be told. You're right, stranger. He's out at the miller ranch. I'll get hold of him right away. For Mr. Thompson about our taxes, you aren't going to forget him, are you? Forget him? I should smile. This army said a man with a scar is forehead. Who's that sound like to you? You mean Leech? I sure do. But who's the mask man and the Indian? Outlaws. They must be. We're going to round up the three of them. When Thompson started for the miller ranch to get the sheriff, the lone ranger walked to the edge of town where he had left Silver in a grove of cotton woods. He avoided the bridge and used the ford to cross the river. On the far side, he stopped for a moment to adjust his mask. Then he headed straight for the camp in the forest. The taunta and Leech were on their feet at the sound of approaching hoof beats and the Indian greeted him. How are you, Kimitabi? Hey, steady, Silver. Leech, you never mentioned that Thompson hired you to collect taxes for him. Well, no. I got that job before he found out about me. How long did you work at it? Oh, I started just after he got the Riverdale. I didn't quit until two weeks ago when he sent me after you. You know a girl about 18 called Sally, dark brown hair, rides a sorrow pony? Well, that'd be Sally Leonard. Well, she was in Thompson's office when I got there. Her father paid their taxes to you, but Thompson says he never received them at the office. Well, that ain't so. He did. Well, I remember the day I brought him in. Well, I wish I knew, Leech. Knew what? Which of you is telling the truth. It's certain I'll never find out if you're put in jail. Mr. I swear I never stole any money. On the other hand, Washington wouldn't send a crook out here to handle the land office. You've got to believe me. I'll decide about that later. Taunta. Uh-huh. We're breaking camp. The sheriff will be here with the posse any minute now. Uh-huh. Time to get things ready. You weren't going to leave me behind, are you? I'm not yet, Leech. Kimitabi, head right this way now. Thompson didn't waste any time. My horse is all saddened. Come out up. You'll have to hurry, Taunta. Are you ready? Then through there wasn't beyond the ridge. Come on, Silver. Get him up there. Come on, Kimitabi. That night, Sally Leonard and her father were alone in the living room of their ranch house. The girl had not stayed in town until the posse had returned and both she and Dan were anxiously awaiting the return of the cowboy they had sent to get the news. But when a rider rained up about in front, it was not he that Sally saw from the window. Paul? What is it, Sally? Mr. Thompson. Now we'll find out if they caught Leech. Door's unlocked. Come on in. How do you folks? Did you get him, Andy? No, no, no. No such luck, Dan. We found their camp and they cleared out. Too bad. If I ever lay hands on that skunk, I... Sure, if he's still looking. Leech, he sure got a good name. Well, you folks got my sympathy. I want to do something about it. All I can anyway. You mean, give us more time to meet the taxes? Well, that'd be simple. But just isn't possible, Dan. I hope they got to be paid by next Monday. Less than a week. I was thinking that maybe I can let you have a loan. You? Oh, Mr. Thompson. Well, if I hadn't trusted Leech, you wouldn't be in this fix. Let's see. $300, isn't it? Yeah. Well, I could spare it for 30 days. You could give me a note with a ranch of security. That'd be fine. A month's all the time I need. You'd have to sell some cattle, Paul. One of it. We can get a herd to market in a month. If you mean this, Andy, it's a deal. You drop rounds in my office tomorrow morning. We'll get the paper signed. I call that right, friendly. Of course, it don't make me feel too good to have to pay my taxes twice, but then... Who is that? Sounded pretty close to howling. There's a white horse cutting across a prairie. What a beauty. It's that masked man Leech is hanging out with. How do you know? You can't see if he's got a mask on from here. I got a hunch, that's all. The way he carries himself, I'd guess it was that stranger. Maybe so. He can't be two people. Well, the sheriff's got to know about this crowd. Want me to come over here? No need for that. See you in town tomorrow, Dan. He know. After Andy Thompson, Dan Leonard and his daughter had seen the Lone Ranger. The masked man headed east for the river. This time he wasted no time in the Ford, but raced across the bridge, counting on Silver's speed in case he was seen. The great horse swept into the forest, on and on through the trees, until at last the masked man rained up in the new camp beyond the ridge. Howdy, Mask Man. Where's Tunnel Leech? Left camp about 15 minutes ago. He left you here alone? That's right, and I'm still here.  I don't understand. Why should Tunnel leave? What happened?  Said he heard a danger signal. Did you hear anything? Nothing but a bird call. Like this? Yeah. Yeah, it was just like that. Was it you? No, but Tonto may have thought it was. I see that he didn't take scout. The call sounded awful close, not more than a couple hundred feet away. It may have been a trap. You going after him? Yes. That's him, ain't it? Tonto! Tunnel, come back. Leech told me about the signal, Kimosabe. You followed it? Not right. Me playing track of horse out there. Bird calls sound further on. Tunnel, not stop. Someone was trying to lead you away from the camp. Ah, lead Tonto maybe half mile that way. And then what? And lead me to clearing. Now note on tree. A note? Where is it? Here. Tonto, come back here to get scout. Maybe follow trail. You want me to do that? No, Kimosabe. A note was written by a friend. You sure? It's in the same handwriting as the one that warned us about Leech. Can I have a look at it, Massman? Yes, here. Do you recognize the handwriting? No. Awful meat and small. Did you see a girl around that cabin where you tried to kill us? A girl? I'm sure a girl wrote that note. Golly, do you see what it says? Yes, Leech. Be sure to follow Thompson the next time he leaves town. We're going to follow instructions, Tonto. But that ain't all. Yes, I know. A murder has been committed. The curtain falls on the first act of our Lone Ranger story. Before the next exciting scenes, please permit us to pause for just a few moments. Now to continue our story. On the morning after the Lone Ranger received the note from the girl, Dan Leonard and Sally rode into town bright and early, as they rained up in front of the land office. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Nobody up and around yet, Sally. Is the office locked? Looks to be. You should have waved another hour. Folks don't get up at daybreak when they live in town. Well, you can't blame me for wanting to get these tax business settled. And I wanted to find out about that man on the White Horse, too. I wonder if the posse picked up his trail last night. I'll still say it was a stranger. His shoulders were subdued and he set up so straight. He couldn't help remembering. Miss Sally. What, Paul? There's a piece of paper tacked up on the door. Might be a notice. Yeah. There might be a message for us. I'm taking a look. Warning. The masked man's found where he's buried. What? What's the matter, Paul? Sally, you know where Thompson lives? He's down there in the street. That's where we're going. Get up out. Get up out. This is it? Yeah. The turners used to live in this cabin. Mr. Thompson rented it when he came to town. You wait here. Don't see why you can't tell me what it's all about, Paul. I don't know what it's about. This note mentions the masked man. Thompson, wake up. What's going on here? Oh, I thought you were still asleep. Just out in the kitchen making me some coffee. Kind of early, aren't you? I guess you didn't catch up with that hombre on the White Horse last night. Nope. You and Sally, I figure not. He must have been up tomorrow with his crooked work. Huh? Just read this. Where'd it come from, Dan? Where'd you find it? It was stacked on the front door of your office. Yeah. No names signed or anything. And that arrow at the bottom. What does that mean? Nothing. It's private business. You want me to get the sheriff? No, tell you it's private. Just do me a favor, Dan, and don't say nothing about it. I'll take care of your business when I get better. I'll take care of your business when I get back. When you get back? Yeah. I'm leaving town for a few hours. I'll be back by noon. Ten minutes later, Andy Thompson was in the saddle and racing out of town for the East. A lone ranger, Leach, and Tonto watched him from the ridge to the north of Riverdale. Then when the government agent had crossed the bridge and disappeared from sight on the far side of the river, they started after him. It was up to Tonto to follow his trail. Get him out of town! Get up there, boy! Come on, Silver! Ten miles from town they cut away from the main trail toward the south. Here the country was rough and the Indian found it harder to read the signs Thompson left behind him. And last, he raised his arm and a signal to stop. Ready, Silver? Move, move! It's a matter of chemo-sabbing. Haven't lost it, have you? No. Him right that way into valley. Yes? You look, valley not big. A rim rock on three sides. He can't get any farther, you mean? That's right. You want to look down in valley, right that way. Along the edge of the rim rock. And keep back from edge so him not see. Be careful. Don't worry. Come on, Silver. Get him up, let's go! We'll leave the horses behind these rocks. That's good. I'll give the word to get down to each. We'll have to crawl the last few feet to the edge. We ain't so far away now. I keep wondering, who is this girl that wrote the note? All we know is that she's helped us before. Down. There's some bushes here. We'll look through them. That's good. We'll see what Thompson is up to. What a drop. Must be five hundred feet. There he is. That pile of stones. That pile of stones. That pile of stones didn't just happen. It's too neat. Do you remember the last line in the note? Yeah. A murder. Yes, Leech. We'll have to wait until Thompson leaves. Then we'll get a closer look at those stones. For nearly half an hour at the Lone Ranger and his two companions watched the tiny figure of the tax collector in the valley below. He left the pile of stones to examine every bit of soft ground near it. At last, he mounted once more and rode up the trail in all of the valley. Not until then did the masked man give the signal to return to their horses. They rode carefully, watchful for any sign of Thompson. It was afternoon when they dismounted by the neat pile of stones. There's no doubt about it, Mason Hill. Yes, no doubt about it. It's a grave. Who buried there? I have an idea, Tonto. Silver and I have a long ride ahead of us before we can make sure. He must have been. There Thompson up there. Him come back. Him shoot. He tries it again. I'm going to pretend to be hit. Keep your sabby. It's all right. Shake your fist at him. You killer. Now get on your horses and go after him. Chase him back to town and then wait for me at our camp. What you do? I didn't think I'm dead. Now hurry.   Tonto and Leets followed the Lone Ranger's instructions. They kept Thompson in sight and they rode across the bridge and into town. Then they returned to camp. The Lone Ranger did not appear that night. One day passed. Two, three, still there was no sign of him and Leets was unable to control his nerves. I don't like it, Tonto. I think we ought to do something. We've been waiting here for three days and what's happened? Nothing. Oh, mask friend, tell us, wait here. Yeah. The sheriff and his party have been out day and night. It's only a matter of time before they stumble on this hideout. And then what happens? Tonto, wait here. They put us both in jail. I may even get up a lynching party. Lone Ranger got planned. Yeah, I say we ought to clear out and try to find him. He might be in trouble. He might need our help. What the... Up with your hands in the name of the law. I told you, Tonto. They got us. Close in, boys.  Stand back there, men. Stand back from the prisoners. I'm putting them in jail. The boys want to hand leech themselves, sheriff. He's getting a trial, same as the Indian. Andy Thompson put a bill through the mask man. That's what these two ought to get. Stand back, I say. Wait, I got a suggestion, sheriff. Maybe if leech was to admit he stole these folks' money and handed over, they might calm down, sir. I never stole any money. You gonna deny I paid you for my taxes? No, Dan. But I gave it to Thompson. If anybody stole it, he did. You can't make us believe that. Will you listen to me? Will you let me tell you what happened? You'd better make it good. I broke out of jail about six months ago back in St. Louis. Now, wait, wait. Thompson found out about it and he said he'd turned me over to the sheriff unless I followed his order. He's just talking to save his lech. You know what he wanted me to do? He wanted me to kill the Lone Ranger. That's a lie. I tried it and I got caught. But the mask man believed me when I told him about Thompson and he came here with me, him and Tonneau. Are you calling that mask man we've been seeing around here the Lone Ranger? I sure am. And this is Tonneau. That's her now. A Lone Ranger don't hang out with crooks like you and I sure sympathize with the boys. If I didn't have my duty to... That's enough, Palaver. Up with him, sheriff. What's that? You're covered. Turn those prisoners over to us.  Maybe. I guess most of the folks around here can forget it too. What I want is justice and Leech deserves a lot more in a few years in jail. While every honest rancher that's paid him taxes stands to lose his ranch, there's only one way to treat pole cats like here. You're right. Grab the sheriff boy so he can't interfere. No, you can't. No, not to argue, sheriff. Andy, I'm not so sure about this. Don't go soft on the stand. Get those two armies and their horses. String a couple ropes over the big branch of that cottonwood. Tonneau. Tonneau here. How about you, Thompson?  Here he comes and that silver he's riding. Now you'll find out if he's a Lone Ranger or not. Stand back, everybody. He's nothing but an outlaw. This time I'll... No, you not shoot him. I'll show you. How's that for proof?  You aren't hurt. I'm not interested in your right hand. Let's see your left. There you are, Marshal. Black Arrow. Bill Desmond, what are you doing here? The mask man brought me. This is government business. Is he really the Lone Ranger? He sure is. Are you duty, Marshal? Right. Thompson, whatever your name is, you're under arrest for murder. For murder? You got nothing against me. That black arrow tattooed on your wrist is enough. Yeah, we can jail you for that, Lord. You'll have to prove it means anything. But the charge is murder. I don't get it, Marshal. There hasn't been any murder around here. You're wrong, Sheriff. I can show you grave about 15 miles east of here near the foot of the rimlock. I don't know how the mask man found it, but he did it. Thompson let us there. That's right. We just followed him. The man who was buried there was shot in the back. And that man was Andrew Thompson. No, hold on. This man is in postage. He killed Thompson and took all his papers. He came here to take charge of the land overs. I told you he was a crook.  Stay there, boys. He hadn't had a chance to get rid of it. You'll find it all in his office or his home. Mask man, can you explain this? If he stole my money, why should he lend me some? Why shouldn't he?  Things had worked out the way he hoped. He might have owned 20 ranches in the valley before the summer was over. Don't worry, don't worry, Dan. He'll get what he deserves. Why didn't you tell me who you were right off, Mask man? I'd have arrested you, the real Andrew Thompson sheriff. And there's another angle to this case, the Marshal and I can't discuss. Like he said, government business. We'll still win. You won't have a hand in it. Move along.  They're Indian. Imagine a crowd. Him, single me. Find out what he wants. What about me, Mask man? You'll have to go back and finish out your sentence, Leech. Is that all? I don't know of any other charge against you. You aren't going to tell him about it. No, no, Leech. I have an idea that when you get out of jail, you'll start a new life. I will if I get a chance. You have it. Kimosabi. What, Hono? That Indian. Bring note from Brentwood. Not from the girl? Huh. You read. Gosh, if it hadn't been for her... Wait, Hono. Get him out of here. What's up? The note doesn't say much. You're leaving? We're needed in Brentwood and we've got a hurry. Come on, Silver. Come on, Silver. Come on, Silver. Hey! SNIFF ...for you have just heard is a copyrighted feature of the lone ranger incorporated.