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| The president's office has been issuing cybersecurity strategies for 20 years, but President Biden's strategy is different in a few ways. Doug Mills |
WITHINBUCKS — Efforts to disrupt the activities of ransomware groups around the world. For years, governments have pressured companies to voluntarily report intrusions into their systems and patch their programs regularly to fix newly discovered vulnerabilities. It's like an iPhone auto-updates every few weeks.
However, the new National Cybersecurity Strategy states that while such good faith efforts are beneficial, sophisticated hackers backed by Russia, China, Iran, or North Korea may attempt to infiltrate critical government or private networks. In a world of constant attempts to do so, the new strategy argues that businesses should instead meet minimum cybersecurity standards.
The strategy is a policy document, not an executive order, but it represents a major shift in attitudes toward the "public-private partnership" that the government has been talking about for years. There is nature. Also, the federal government cannot impose cybersecurity requirements on government facilities such as hospitals that are targeted by hackers.
“A fundamental recognition in strategy is that voluntary approaches to protecting ‘critical infrastructure and networks’ are inadequate,” said Anne, Deputy National Security Advisor for Cyber and Emerging Technologies. says. Say. Speaking at the Institute for Strategic and International Studies event, Neuberger said: Washington think tank.
Since the George W. Bush administration 20 years ago, every administration has announced some form of cybersecurity strategy. Mainly to demand greater power from the private industries that control much of America's digital infrastructure, and to expand the government's role in taking proactive action to preempt cyberattacks. especially from abroad.
It just reconsiders America's cyber social pact," said Kemba Walden, acting director of the National Cyber Agency, in a White House post created by Congress two years ago.
The government also bolstered defenses, disrupting a major hacking group that locked hospital records and froze meat processors across the country, along with government activity in Baltimore, Atlanta, and small towns across the country. added that the responsibility for letting. Texas has grown.
"You have to," said Mr. Walden. So while we expect more from the private sector, nonprofits, and industry partners, we also expect more from ourselves. ”
Read in conjunction with the Cybersecurity Strategy issued by his three previous presidents, the new document reflects how attack and defense in the realm are central to national security policy.
The Bush administration has never publicly acknowledged America's cyber attack capabilities, even though one country has launched the most sophisticated cyber attacks against others. A covert effort to use code to sabotage Iran's nuclear fuel facilities. The Obama administration has been reluctant to identify Russia and China as the forces behind the massive hack against the US government.
The Trump administration stepped up America's offensive initiatives against foreign hackers and state-sponsored actors. Also, Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei, which has been accused of being part of the Chinese government, is building high-speed 5G networks in the United States and among its allies, and such networks are owned by the company. warned that it would be claimed to have been built. Managing it would allow Beijing to shut down the system in the event of Chinese surveillance or conflict.
However, the Trump administration will not require U.S. companies to establish minimum protections for critical infrastructure or to be held liable for damages if unaddressed vulnerabilities are exploited. They weren't very proactive.
Imposing new forms of liability would require significant legislative changes. Some White House officials have warned that Trump could face irrefutable opposition if he admits it.
Former National Security Agency general counsel Glenn S. Gerstel said the move to establish corporate responsibility when the Biden administration failed to meet basic security needs was "a process spanning decades. Yes, it will have an impact." He said.
He said, referring to a famous flammable vehicle recalled in 1978, "The cyber world is finally saying Pintos is responsible for Ford's failure to spend money safely." bottom.
In some ways, we are catching up with the steps the Biden administration took in its first struggling year, which began with the massive hacking of systems used by both civilian industry and the military.
After a Russian ransomware group shut down Colonial's pipelines that process much of the gasoline and jet fuel along the East Coast, the Biden administration took over a little-known legal authority held by the Transportation Security Administration. rice field. It is used to regulate the country's vast energy network. pipeline. Pipeline owners and operators currently have to submit to extensive standards set primarily by the federal government, and later this week, the Environmental Protection Agency will do the same for water pipelines.
No other federal agency requires minimum standards for hospital cybersecurity and is primarily regulated by states. Attacks have also targeted medical centers from Vermont to Florida.
Neuberger said in an interview Wednesday, "We should have done many of these things years ago after a cyberattack was first used to cut power to thousands of people in Ukraine." It was.
Weeks after the Russian invasion, Ukraine changed laws to allow ministries to move databases and many government operations to the cloud to back up servers and data center computers. Kyiv and other cities were later targeted by Russian artillery. Within weeks, many of these server farms were destroyed, but the government continued to operate, using satellite systems such as Starlink, which were introduced after the outbreak of the war, to communicate with servers abroad. . field. field.
US strategy is catching up with an increasingly aggressive attack program. Two years ago, the F.B.I. began using search warrants to locate and dismantle pieces of malicious code found on corporate networks. Most recently, it hacked into a ransomware group's network and deleted documents belonging to the group's victims, as well as the "decryption key" that unlocked the system, thwarting an attempt to collect a large ransom.
F.B.I. can work in the national network. It is the responsibility of the US Cyber Command to track down Russian hacking groups like her Kilnet, a pro-Moscow group involved in a series of denial-of-service attacks that began early in the war in Ukraine. It slowed Russian intelligence operations in 2018 and around her 2020 US presidential election.
But neither is a permanent solution. Some groups targeted by the United States are newly organized, often under different names.
The only time Biden met Russian leader Vladimir V. Putin was in Geneva in 2021. That's when ransomware attacks increased, threatening consumers, hospital patients, and factory workers. The main reason was concern that it was affecting their lives. Biden has warned Russian leaders that his government is responsible for attacks from Russian territory.
After months of lull, her group of prominent hackers was raided by Russian authorities in Moscow. However, that cooperation ended with the start of the war in Ukraine.
In a speech at Mellon University this week, Jenn, director of cybersecurity and infrastructure at Carnegie University, said Easterly "seeks to hold entities accountable for failing to meet their obligations to customers." I was. He said he called on the government to take action. It's been passed down," he said.
Biden's New Cybersecurity Plan Gives Tech Companies Accountability
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