• U.S. “black budget” reveals unwieldy bureaucracy, misplaced priorities: expert

    Classified budget figures and successes and failures by American intelligence agencies, exposed for the first time this week by the Washington Post, show a massive bureaucracy with misplaced priorities, according to a cybersecurity and privacy expert. “The major failure identified in all of the post-9/11 assessments was a ‘failure to connect the dots,’” the expert said. “Nevertheless, the vast majority of the black budget is being spent on data acquisition — collecting more dots — rather than analysis.”

  • Lawmakers mull oversight of U.S. cyberattack capabilities and operations

    There has not yet been a public discussion of U.S. offensive cyberattack capabilities — and of actual U.S. cyberattacks — and the subject had been classified until a few years ago. Even after the subject came more into the open, only the fact that the United States had the capability to initiate offensive cyberattacks was acknowledged. With the growing attention to cyber operations – both defensive and offensive — the question of oversight is set to follow.

  • Former Pentagon No. 2 suspected of being source of Stuxnet leaks

    The Justice Department has informed Gen. (Ret.) James E. “Hoss” Cartwright that he is the target of an investigation into the leaking of a secret U.S.-Israeli cyber campaign to slow down Iran nuclear weapons program. The four-star Marine Corps general served as deputy chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and was part of President Obama’s inner circle on many important national security issues before retiring in 2011.

  • Israel taps 10th graders’ cybersecurity skills to expand cybersecuity recruitment pool

    Israel has been subjected to a growing number of cyberattacks – and has itself used cyber-warfare against its adversaries. To make sure it stays ahead, Israel is accelerating its recruitment and development efforts in cybersecurity. Among other initiatives, the country is expanding the pool of potential cyberwarriors by going into high school classrooms to tap the cyber skills of tenth-graders.

  • FEMA issues annual National Preparedness Report

    Presidential Policy Directive 8: National Preparedness requires an annual National Preparedness Report (NPR) that summarizes national progress in building, sustaining, and delivering the thirty-one core capabilities outlined in the National Preparedness Goal. The 2013 NPR presents an opportunity to reflect on the progress that that has been made in strengthening national preparedness and to identify where preparedness gaps remain.

  • Obama orders U.S. intelligence to develop a list of targets for U.S. cyberattacks

    President Barack Obama last October has ordered U.S. intelligence agencies to develop a list of overseas targets for possible offensive cyberattacks by the United States. The directive says that “The secretary of defense, the DNI [Director of National Intelligence], and the director of the CIA … shall prepare for approval by the president through the National Security Advisor a plan that identifies potential systems, processes and infrastructure against which the United States should establish and maintain Offensive Cyber Effects Operations (OCEO) capabilities….”

  • U.S. military “unprepared” for cyberattacks by “top-tier,” cyber-capable adversary: Pentagon

    A new Pentagon study concludes that the U.S. military is unprepared for a full-scale cyber-conflict with a top-tier, cyber-capable adversary. The report says the United States must increase its offensive cyberwarfare capabilities, and that the U.S. intelligence agencies must invest more resources in obtaining information about other countries’ cyberwar capabilities and plans. The report says that the United States must maintain the threat of a nuclear strike as a deterrent to a major cyberattack by other countries. The report warns that the Pentagon cannot be confident its military computer systems and communication networks are not compromised because many of the components of these systems and networks are made in countries which pose the main cyberthreat to U.S. national security.

  • U.S. cyberstrikes against adversaries to require presidential authority

    Under a new administration policy, the president would have the authority to order a pre-emptive cyberattack against an adversary if the United States receives credible evidence of a major cyberattack being planned against the country from overseas. So far, the administration is known to have launched a sustained cyberattack only once – against Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities – in an operation code-named Olympic Games.

  • Pentagon to bolster U.S cyberwar capabilities

    The Department of Defense is planning an expansion of the U.S. Cyber Command, and the Pentagon plans on recruiting thousands of code crackers, online security professionals, and hackers in order to assemble the nation’s largest cyber army ever.

  • Experts, engineers gather to contribute to DARPA’s Plan X

    DARPA’s Plan X will attempt to create revolutionary technologies for understanding, planning, and managing DoD cyber missions in real-time, large-scale, and dynamic network environments; Proposers’ Day dialogue cements program approach

  • Former DHS official says U.S. should go on cybersecurity offensive

    Stewart Baker, the first assistant secretary for policy at DHS under President George W. Bush, has a straightforward theory when it comes to cyber security in the United States: “To prevail in the cybersecurity war, defense is not enough”; not all cuber experts agree with him

  • DARPA solicits proposals for offensive cyberwar technologies

    DARPA, the Pentagon’s research outfit, announced that next month it will host a meeting for defense contractors in which the agency will outline the Pentagon’s need for “revolutionary technologies for understanding, planning and managing cyberwarfare”; the announcement is the latest indication of the greater willingness of military planners and policy makers to discuss U.S. offensive cyberwar capabilities and plans openly

  • Improved disaster resilience is imperative for U.S: report

    A new report from the National Academies says that it is essential for the United States to bolster resilience to natural and human-caused disasters, and that this will require complementary federal policies and locally driven actions that center on a national vision – a culture of resilience; improving resilience should be seen as a long-term process, but it can be coordinated around measurable short-term goals that will allow communities better to prepare and plan for, withstand, recover from, and adapt to adverse events

  • Novel network model to help in cyberwarfare, conservation, and disease prevention

    Computer networks are the battlefields in cyberwarfare, as exemplified by the U.S. recent use of computer viruses to attack Iran’s nuclear program; researchers develop a computer model which could help military strategists devise the most damaging cyber attacks as well as guard America’s critical infrastructure

  • New book confirms Israel behind killing of Iran nuclear scientists

    A book to be published today offers details about, Israel’s campaign to take out Iranian nuclear scientists, a campaign which is part of the Israel’s broader effort to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons; the book also says that the cyber campaign against Iran’s nuclear program was an Israeli innovation, not an American one as recently reported; it was the brainchild of Israel’s military intelligence agency (AMAN) and Unit 8-200 — Israel’s equivalent of the eavesdropping, code-breaking National Security Agency (NSA) — and endorsed by the White House at Israel’s suggestion