A cyberattack can't blow up the world, but it can upend geopolitical stability. It can destroy national alliances, and work to undermine the most powerful democracy on Earth. It can even undercut the very idea of truth. Short of nuclear weapons, hacking has become the most destabilizing tool in geopolitics–which makes it all the more absurd that the US has apparently decided to dramatically downplay its importance.

Last month, allegedly United Arab Emirates-backed hackers planted a false, inflammatory story on Qatari news sites that contributed to the disruption of Middle East relations. Last year, a Russian hacking and disinformation campaign targeted the US presidential election. Ukraine has been under constant strain of cyberattack for years now. And yet despite these clear and present dangers, the US State Department plans to shutter its Cyber Security branch, according to multiple reports and confirmed independently to WIRED by a person familiar with the matter.

The move doesn't just potentially weaken America's ability to cope with increasing cyberthreats at home and abroad. It also underscores the State Department's blindness to the current global state of affairs. In 2017, cyberhacking serves not only as a pointed tool for nations and nation-state-backed hackers to take down power grids, but an easily accessible tool available to whoever wants to wreak world havoc by targeting information. Disinformation campaigns like the one that rocked Qatar go one step further, threatening to undermine base reality. The dangers that cyberattacks present require exactly the kind of coordinated, international response that the State Department should invest in, not bury in a bureaucratic backwater.

“It’s manifestly ridiculous,” says Paul Scharre, Director of the Technology and National Security Program at the Center for New American Security. “That would be like the equivalent of during the Industrial Revolution saying ‘this electricity thing is not important to us.’ It seems kind of obviously wrong. I don’t frankly understand what Secretary of State Tillerson is doing over there at State.”

Downgraded

Tillerson plans to place the office under the umbrella of the economic bureau, sending the message that cybersecurity is a business matter, rather than integral to national and international stability. Christopher Painter, well-respected leader of the cybersecurity team, is being forced out at the end of the month, taking with him much-needed expertise.

“[The economic bureau] are the people who talk about the allocation of the international phone numbers. I think it’s perfect job for them,” says James Lewis, senior vice president at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, with a heavy dose of sarcasm.

Experts across the political spectrum describe this as a bad idea. State’s cybersecurity office doesn't directly administer cyberattacks or defenses, but serves a vital diplomatic function. While the CIA and NSA work in secret to keep America safe from cyber and other threats, it's the state department that serves as the public face of US values. It communicates US interests with allies and adversaries, and negotiates policies about defensive and offensive measures, retaliations, and treaties. Among its successes: Leading the 2010 bilateral talks with Russia, which resulted in the best intel the US has on how Russia approaches information security offensive and defensively, says Laura Galante, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council who participated in those negotiations while at the Department of Defense.

Reached for comment, a state department spokesperson said: “The secretary is leading a review of the department and that includes all the envoy offices.” The point of that review is to find redundancies, the spokesperson said, and make sure issues are being dealt with by the office with the most resources. The spokesperson did not confirm the merger of the two offices.