In an increasing era of mobile technology and BYOD, federal workers are often juggling work, personal and “classified” lives throughout their days. This can mean several devices with differing degrees of security coming into the government landscape.
While single devices are being configured to address mobile data needs, the cog in that wheel is the individual using the technology, experts say. Keep reading →
Few people would dispute that the United States is in the cross-hairs when it comes to cyber attacks. After all, the U.S. is the country that is the most dependent on the Internet as a component of our critical infrastructure.
Cyber attacks on our critical infrastructure have evolved over the years and pose a substantial threat that should concern everyone. Keep reading →
LAS VEGAS (CNNMoney) — Wearing a t-shirt and jeans, America’s top spymaster — National Security Agency Director Gen. Keith Alexander, also the head of the U.S. Cyber Command — took the stage Friday at the nation’s largest hacker convention to deliver a recruiting pitch.
“In this room, this room right here, is the talent our nation needs to secure cyberspace,” Alexander told the standing-room-only audience at DefCon, a grassroots gathering in Las Vegas expected to draw a record 16,000 attendees this year. “We need great talent. We don’t pay as high as everybody else, but we’re fun to be around.” Keep reading →
A senior National Security Agency official today said the agency is racing to embrace an approach to mobile technology that once would have been unthinkable for one of the government’s most secretive agencies, by moving toward 100% end-to-end reliance on commercial communications technology.
NSA Director of Information Assurance Deborah Plunkett told an industry group today in Washington that, “Unless we do this, we will not be able to meet the demand signals from our customers.” Keep reading →
The nation needs cyber-security legislation to authorize sharing of threat data between industry and government in real time, said Gen. Keith Alexander, chief of both the National Security Agency and the US Cyber Command, and it can be done without any danger to individual privacy.
“This cyber legislation that’s coming up is going to be absolutely vital to the future of our country,” said Gen. Alexander. Keep reading →
The spirit of necessity has taken hold and U.S. Cyber Command, the National Security Agency (NSA) and even the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) along with the office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) are sharing cyber intelligence with critical infrastructure providers and technology companies in the private sector.
Of course this is done on a case by case basis and there clearly needs to be an identified threat and of course a need to know. Keep reading →
Many believe leaders are born, not made. Chris Inglis disagrees.
The National Security Agency’s Deputy Director explained why at the annual Federal Senior Management Conference in Cambridge, Maryland. He kicked off the event at a Sunday evening dinner reception by recounting a memory of a first meeting with about a dozen federal workers he was about to manage. Keep reading →
It appears that all the expert cyber threat warnings and media coverage–and now a realistic cyber attack simulation on New York’s power grid–has gotten the attention of Washington.
In the latest example, according to an account published March 8 by Politico, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan, during a classified briefing in the Office of Senate Security, showed lawmakers how a hacker could breach control systems of New York City’s electric system and trigger a ripple effect throughout the population and private sector. Keep reading →
Federal information technology officials are on a mission to hammer out a new, more coherent strategy for using mobile technology in government by the end of next month. But already, they are beginning to conclude that parallel efforts focused on outward-facing citizen services and inward-focused workforce productivity opportunities must be viewed increasingly from a larger, more integrated perspective, according to Richard Holgate.
Holgate, CIO and assistant director for science and technology for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), is playing a lead role in developing a new “federal mobility strategy” announced last month by U.S. CIO Steven VanRoekel during the Consumer Electronics Show. Keep reading →
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski today called upon the nation’s Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to “take concrete steps” to improve Internet security for consumers and critical infrastructure, warning that a failure to do so could slow broadband adoption and threaten the nation’s economy.
With more than $8 trillion exchanged electronically every year, Genachowski warned that sophisticated hackers are gaining the expertise to “shut down the Internet…shut down our economy [and] compromise our growth engine.” Keep reading →