While State Department officials say that online censorship, surveillance and other Internet-related human rights concerns are a mainstay on their diplomatic agenda when dealing with repressive regimes, there is a fine line to walk between asserting core values such as freedom of speech and religion without sacrificing progress on a number of other cyber issues where common ground is easier to find, according to Howard Schmidt, who recently stepped down as White House cybersecurity coordinator.

Speaking at Gartner's annual security and risk management summit, Schmidt warned against allowing the perfect to be the enemy of the good in cybersecurity talks with foreign nations, "because people just fundamentally don't agree."

"Things that we fundamentally believe in," Schmidt said, "other countries say, 'Well, not so fast. That undermines our society.' And while we disagree, and we disagree vehemently about some of those things, we still don't want to focus our energy and time on the things we don't agree on. Let's look for the things we can agree on internationally."

That becomes especially important in talks with major powers such as Russia and China, which have checkered histories of using the Internet to squelch opposition, but with whom the United States maintains important, if fragile, strategic and economic relationships.

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