From: InfoSec News (isnc4i.org)
Date: Tue Apr 13 2004 - 03:46:53 CDT

• Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ]

Forwarded from: Mark Bernard <mbernardnbnet.nb.ca>

http://www.fcw.com/fcw/articles/2004/0329/web-dhs-03-30-04.asp

By Florence Olsen
March 30, 2004

In the event of a cyberattack on the nation's infrastructure, the
Homeland Security Department would have the authority and the
wherewithal to coordinate an appropriate response, department
officials told lawmakers today.

Members of the House Select Committee on Homeland Security questioned
top information technology officials at DHS, focusing on recent
reports that the department remains disorganized within and not
well-coordinated with other federal, state and local agencies and the
private sector.

Rep. Robert Andrews (D-N.J.) said he is concerned about the lack of
clear lines of authority for responding to a national cyberattack.
"Who's in charge when we have a crisis?" he asked.

Robert Liscouski, assistant secretary for infrastructure protection at
DHS, said lines of communication are in place so that DHS could
coordinate a national response. He said DHS' authority to coordinate a
response is based on a presidential directive, Homeland Security
Presidential Directive No. 7, which President Bush issued on Dec. 17,
2003. Authorities are still filling in the details of that directive,
he said.

The fiscal 2005 budget for the National Cyber Security Division is $79
million, most of which is allocated for building up a national
cyberspace security readiness and response system, Liscouski said. The
core of that system is the existing U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness
Team.

For its internal security needs, department officials announced that
they will use a commercial product, called Trusted Agent FISMA, to
capture and maintain security reporting data required under the
Federal Information Security Management Act of 2002. Steven Cooper,
DHS' chief information officer, said the use of that tool should
"improve the timeliness and accuracy of our reporting." DHS has fared
poorly in recent reports on FISMA compliance.

_________________________________________
ISN mailing list
Sponsored by: OSVDB.org

• Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ]