POLICY: April 2010 Archives

During a hearing on the nominations of Keith Alexander to head CYBERCOM (and Admiral Winnfield to head NORAD and NORTHCOM) were the first time that  operational responsibilities of CYBERCOM have been discussed in a public forum.  READ MORE

Senate Committee on Armed Services Archived Webcast

Director Robert S. Mueller, III has named Gordon M. Snow assistant director of the FBI's Cyber Division.  "The FBI considers the cyber threat against our nation to be one of the greatest concerns of the 21st century," said Director Mueller. "Protecting the United States against cyber crimes is one of the FBI's highest priorities and, in fact, is the FBI's highest criminal priority.

FBI Press Release...

Imagine a botnet comprised of 100 million infected computers working together as one -- the cybersecurity world's version of a WMD.  Some believe this threat is soon coming straight out of Africa.  READ MORE

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recommended that the White House do more to define roles and responsibilities under the Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative (CNCI) and to set up measures for the effectiveness of cybersecurity activities.

Without such measures, federal agencies have continued to pursue separate cybersecurity projects with no true sense of how they are supporting the CNCI, GAO warned in a report, Cybersecurity: Progress Made but Challenges Remain in Defining and Coordinating the Comprehensive National Initiative.  READ MORE

GAO Report

In preparation for a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on his nomination to head Cyber Command Lt. Gen. Keith Alexander said that the U.S. must fire back against cyber attacks swiftly and strongly and should act to counter or disable a threat even when the identity of the attacker is unknown. READ MORE

RELATED:  Senators move carefully on Pentagon Cyber Command, Read More...

Foreign nations are increasingly exploiting the Internet, including social network sites, to conduct industrial espionage against Defense Department contractors, according to a recently released government report.  READ MORE

REPORT - Targeting U.S. Technologies: A Trend Analysis of Reporting from Defense Industry



RELATED:  Shadows in the Cloud: An investigation into cyber espionage 2.0

A recent report by the Information Warfare Monitor and Shadowserver Foundation says a cyber-spy system systematically targeted and compromised computer systems in India, the Offices of the Dalai Lama, the United Nations, and several other countries.  The report further states that these activities have been pilfering highly classified and other sensitive documents related to missile systems, the movement of military forces and relations among countries.  READ MORE

REPORT


RELATED:  Cyberattack Concerns High

Nearly three-quarters of the respondents to a survey of respondents who work in national defense and security departments or agencies also said the possibility is "high" for a cyberattack by a foreign nation in the next year.  READ MORE

REPORT

The latest draft of a bill by Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Rockefeller, D-W.V., and Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, which has been in the works for a year, would give the president the authority to declare a cybersecurity emergency.

The bill calls on the White House and private owners and operators of critical infrastructure, such as telecommunications systems and electrical grids, to work out in advance a response and recovery plan that would be implemented after an emergency is declared.

The latest version of the bill aims to develop a collaborative relationship between federal regulators and private companies responsible for critical infrastructure. For example, it calls for the government and those companies to identify and adopt the best cybersecurity practices.

Companies that fail to adopt those best practices would be required to implement remediation plans.  The legislation also would create a federal rulemaking process to identify and classify specific information technology networks that must be protected from disruption or incapacitation.  READ MORE

Senate PRESS RELEASE

REBUTTAL:   Why Rockefeller-Snowe's Regulations Won't Prepare The US For Cyberwar: READ MORE