Distributed mining is the defense against attack.
Which implies that it needs a defense. Sans that it can be brought down. Governments can ban GPUs, mining rigs etc. so the defense gets weak while they can have powerful hardware.
What does the technology have to prevent such a thing from occurring?
Miners are both the defenders of
BTC and the minters of
BTC.
ASICs are around the corner, but whether that makes the network safer or not is open for debate. I tend to think it does.