Sunday, April 19, 2009

The Latest from National Terror Alert Response Center






The Latest from National Terror
Alert Response Center


Link to Homeland Security News







Wanted: Computer Hackers … To Help Government


Posted: 18 Apr 2009 11:47 PM PDT



Federal authorities aren’t looking to prosecute them, but to pay them to secure

the nation’s networks.


General Dynamics Information Technology put out an ad last month on behalf

of the Homeland Security Department seeking someone who could “think like

the bad guy.”

Applicants, it said, must understand hackers’ tools and tactics and be able to
analyze Internet traffic and identify vulnerabilities in the federal systems.


In the Pentagon’s budget request submitted last week, Defense Secretary

Robert Gates said the Pentagon will increase the number of cyberexperts it

can train each year from 80 to 250 by 2011.


With warnings that the U.S. is ill-prepared for a cyberattack, the White

House conducted a 60-day study of how the government can better manage

and use technology to protect everything from the electrical grid and stock

markets to tax data, airline flight systems, and nuclear launch codes.


President Barack Obama appointed a former Bush administration
aide, Melissa Hathaway, to head the effort, and her report was delivered

Friday, the White House said.


While the country had detailed plans for floods, fires or errant planes drifting

into protected airspace, there is no similar response etched out for a major

computer attack.


David Powner, director of technology issues for the Government Accountability

Office, told Congress last month that the U.S. has no recovery plan for a digital

disaster.


"We’re clearly not as prepared as we should be,” he said.


Administration officials says the U.S. has not kept pace with technological

innovations needed to protect its computer networks against emerging threats

from hackers, criminals or other nations looking for national security secrets.


U.S. computer networks, including those at the Pentagon and other federal

agencies, are under persistent attack, ranging from nuisance hacking to more

nefarious assaults, possibly from other nations, such as China. Industry leaders

told Congress during a recent hearing that law enforcement and other protections

are too outdated to fend off threats from criminals, terrorists and unfriendly

foreign nations.


via 1010wins.com - Wanted: Computer Hackers … To Help Government.



This story comes to us via Homeland Security - National
Terror Alert. National Terror Alert is America's trusted source for
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Chinese Spies May Have Put Chips In US Planes


Posted: 18 Apr 2009 11:30 PM PDT



Chinese cyber spies have penetrated so deep into the US system — ranging from

its secure defense network, banking system, electricity grid to putting spy chips into
its defense planes — that it can cause serious damage to the US any time, a top US
official on counter-intelligence has said.


“Chinese penetrations of unclassified DoD networks have also been widely reported.

Those are more sophisticated, though hardly state of the art,” said National

Counterintelligence Executive, Joel Brenner, at the Austin University Texas last

week, according to a transcript made available on Wednesday.


Listing out some of the examples of Chinese cyber spy penetration, he said: “We’re

also seeing counterfeit routers and chips, and some of those chips have made their

way into US military fighter aircraft.. You don’t sneak counterfeit chips into another
nation’s aircraft to steal data. When it’s done intentionally, it’s done to degrade

systems, or to have the ability to do so at a time of one’s choosing.”


Referring to the Chinese networks penetrating the cyber grids, he said: “Do I

worry about those grids, and about air traffic control systems, water supply

systems, and so on? You bet I do. America’s networks are being mapped. There

has also been experience of both Chinese and criminal network operations in the networks of some of the banks”.


Source



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