New Bill Would Unite Business And Gov In Cybersecurity Fight

By Lisa Kellman

In a press conference Wednesday, the top Republican and Democrat on the House intelligence Committee introduced legislation that would help the private sector prepare themselves against cyber attacks.

“The threat is imminent. The threat can occur tomorrow,” warned Rep. C.A “Dutch” Ruppersberger (D-Md.), the committee’s ranking member. “Some of our key people predict and I feel this way too … we will have a catastrophic attack within the next year.”

The duo presented an 11 page cybersecurity bill that would unite the private and federal sectors to fight cyber attacks and protect intellectual property. The bill would allow the federal government to “share classified cyber threat information with approved American companies.”

“We have classified information that would be very beneficial on possible threats to networks that under current law and under the current arrangement cannot be shared with the private sector,” said Rogers. 

The legislation would also make it easier for the private sector to voluntarily share cyber threat information with the U.S. government.

Rogers emphasized the urgency of the bill, noting that countries like Russia and China have spent billions of dollars to create technology for cyber attacks and “cyber economic espionage” which, can cost the economy up to $1 trillion each year. According to Rogers, companies can and have lost millions of dollars from these attacks and one company in particular lost as many as 20,000 manufacturing jobs.

The Chairman reported that many agencies have been approached as well as the White House and none have opposed the plan.

FCC Announces New Cyber Security Initiative For Small Businesses

By Adrianna McGinley

A broadband connection can increase annual revenue for a small business by $200,000, according to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chair Julius Genachowski, but only if there are adequate cyber security measures in place.

During a discussion Monday at the Chamber of Commerce, Genachowski praised the work of a partnership between the FCC, the Department of Homeland Security, and the private sector and announced the release of the “Small Biz Cyber Planner”, a free, online tool to help small businesses develop customized cyber security plans.

Genachowski cited a 2011 Connected Nations Study showing the financial benefits of being online for a small business but added if sufficient security measures have not been taken, the result of a cyber attack could average a loss of $200,000.

“Failure to take cyber security seriously can potentially negate the benefits of being online,” Genachowski warned.

According to a 2011 Small Business Cybersecurity Survey conducted by the National Cyber Security Alliance and Symantec, 77 percent of small and medium business do not have a formal internet security policy in place, and 48 percent do not have even an informal policy. Despite these numbers, 85 percent of the 1,045 small business owners surveyed, reported they feel their systems are secure.

“Not to consider cyber security is a little bit like leaving your money lying around on a table and thinking that that’s not going to be a problem,” said former Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff.

The Symantec/NCSA survey found that because of high costs, 85 percent of small businesses have no outside IT support. Chertoff said there is a need to create security resources that are understandable and accessible to “ordinary mortals”.

“The beauty of what’s been launched here…is that it makes accessible to people who are not full-time technology wizards the basic instructions and basic elements of a cyber security plan,” Chertoff explained.

Genachowski also announced that this week, the FCC will vote to modernize the Universal Service Fund, in order to provide infrastructure to 18 million people in rural communities across the U.S. who currently have no broadband access. The goal, he said, is to have universal broadband access by the end of the decade.

“Connecting these communities will create and save businesses that otherwise couldn’t exist,” Genchowski noted.

Napolitano Grilled On New Deportation Policies

By Adrianna McGinley

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano defended the Obama administration’s new guidelines prioritizing criminal deportations during an appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday, arguing that it makes sense economically.

Napolitano cited that each removal costs DHS between 23 and 30 thousand dollars, not including the cost to the Justice Department. She said this means DHS is only able to finance 400,000 removals per year, and with over 10 million estimated undocumented immigrants in the country, prioritization is essential.

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) said he is concerned because ICE leaders told him the new “confusing” guidelines have caused low officer moral. 

“The new standards calling on them to consider DREAM Act type issues in determining whether or not the person they detain ought to be released or not, whether they’ve got a high school diploma, whether or not they might be a witness to a crime, that these are very confusing directives and that makes it more difficult for them to act effectively to apprehend people here illegally.” 

Sessions then accused Napolitano of “rolling her eyes” at the statement.

“From me as a person who worked with federal agents for years,” Sessions said. “When you hear this kind of comment and votes of no confidence, I’ve never heard of that, you should be paying real attention to them, not rolling your eyes at them.”

“I’m not rolling my eyes, what I’m suggesting is that results matter here, and priorities really matter,” Napolitano defended. “The results reflect the priorities we have set, and these are priorities that are consistent with prior administrations.”

“We could just remove anybody without any priorities, and that would be one way to do it,” Napolitano said. “Or the other way, and the better way, and probably the way you [Sen. Sessions] ran your office when you were a prosecutor, is to say we want to focus on expediting removal of those who are criminals, of those who are fugitives, of those who are repeat violators, of those who are recent entrance, meaning within five years in to the United States, and what you are now seeing is that the numbers reflect those priorities.”

Sessions also questioned reports citing a significant increase in deportations over the last few years saying, “I’m told that ICE carried over from last year 19,000 removals and they’re counting them this year, and it’s sort of a gimmick to making the removals look higher than they are.”

Napolitano denied the accusation.

“I think that what you’re referring to Senator is in the movement from FY ‘09 to FY ‘10, we made the decision that we would not count a removal until there was an actual verified departure from the country, and that had the effect of moving some removals from ‘09 in to ‘10.”

The Committee also questioned Napolitano on TSA procedures and DHS efforts to increase cyber security, as well as detainee treatment and standards of immigrant detention centers brought to light last night in a Frontline special called “Lost in Detention”.

9-11 Commission Warns U.S. Still Vulnerable 10 Years After Attacks

Seven members of the 9/11 commission accused lawmakers Wednesday of leaving the U.S. vulnerable to attacks by failing to implement the recommendation the commission made in 2004.

“We are safer but we are not as secure yet as we can or should be,” Chairman Thomas Kean told the Bipartisan Policy Center (BPC) in Washington, D.C.

The commission’s original report contained 41 recommendations to improve US security. Due to insufficient progress, however, the committee issued a new report Wednesday detailing nine commission recommendations that remain unfulfilled and are causing a gap in the country’s security. 

Among those failures was the stubbornness of Congress.

“Reformation of congress was a frustrating thing to ask but we still asked for it,” Commissioner Fred F. Fielding stated. “However, they did not make the bicameral committee we requested and instead are maintaining the status quo.”

One lawmaker, however, responded by accusing the administration of dragging its feet on cracking down on so-called “lone-wolf” terrorists operating inside the U.S.

“I am troubled that the White House has not named a lead federal agency to coordinate disparate efforts to combat homegrown terrorism,” said Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), the top Republican on the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee. “I urge the Administration to establish a unified front against this important and evolving threat.”

Commission Vice Chairman Lee H. Hamilton related that the nation’s detection system falls short in critical ways. While the US has improved its security check on those who arrive in the country, there is still an ineffective system that monitors who leaves the country or remains in the country with expired visas. Hamilton revealed that this is exactly how two 9-11 attackers were able to escape capture. 

Another failure of the commission that all panelists agreed upon was their inability to place full control of the entire intelligence community in the hands of the Director of National Intelligence.

Overall, panelists revealed that there are still many communication issues within the government, ambiguity with how to deal with detainees, under developed cyber security and ineffective research and testing performed by Transportation Security on explosive-detection equipment.

“The commission laid out recommendations in a functioning reality,” Hamilton deplored, “and I have no idea why it has not been done.”

While the report seems very grim, panelists did agree that the US is extensively safer than it was 10 years ago.

“We have definitely seen progress but we can’t pat ourselves on the back too strongly,” Hamilton warned. “We haven’t solved the problem and this is great criticism of the US government.”

Congress Questions Napolitano On Role Of DHS

By Julianne LaJeunesse, University of New Mexico-Talk Radio News Service

If you could count all of the concerns that were thrown at U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Janet Napolitano at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Wednesday, it might make you more than a math whiz, it might make you curious. Curious as to why and how the department is going to handle international border issues, cyber terrorism and how the U.S. legal system will adequately handle Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s New York City trial.

The committee hearing was intended to provide oversight over DHS, and several times the role of the department was questioned. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) asked Napolitano about the department’s role in protecting cyber security, suggesting the entity may not be the best group for the job.

“When you take out the technical aspects, and the legal aspects, it’s hard to see how Homeland Security ends up with a very strong platform for persistent leadership, unless there’s some vehicle for coordinating the DNI [Director of National Intelligence], and you, and the Attorney General, and everybody together, and I’m not comfortable that that presently exists,” Whitehouse said. “I think the NSC [National Security Council] is a good interim measure, but it would seem that that should evolve into a more formal cyber-specific government structure at some point.”

Though Whitehouse suggested that cyber security could be handled by another government arm, too much government role was a theme that Senators Arlen Specter (D-Penn.) and Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) said may be unnecessary. The two said transportation measures, such as some airport securities and aggressive border patrol practices, could be safely downgraded if proof of their need doesn’t exist.

“I wonder, do you have results as to what all of these elaborate tests at airports show?” Specter asked. “Is all of it really necessary? Because if it is, fine.”

Generally, however, the committee was not ready to dismiss the precautions taken by the department, and indeed did call for more action from Napolitano and her staff in regard to answering questions about how best to deal with issues of illegal immigrant labor and its good and bad effects on U.S. farming. Napolitano didn’t have a direct comment on the utility of illegal immigrant employment, but did say that the DHS is starting to better track immigrants who have overstayed the Visa allowance.

Similarly, the Secretary left Attorney General Eric Holder’s decision to prosecute Khalid Sheik Mohmmamed, one of five suspected September 11th terrorists, to the U.S. Department of Justice, saying, “that is a prosecution decision, as to where, and in what venue to bring a case.” “I believe that is properly held by the AG.”