Category Archives: congress

Deepfake laws emerge as harassment, security threats come into focus

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A new flurry of state and federal legislation that aims to better understand the creation of doctored video and audio files — and help victims respond — couldn’t have come soon enough, analysts say.  The manipulated content, better known as deepfakes, has been used to falsely portray House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as ill or inebriated in a video that went viral in 2019. Other examples include a faked video of former president Obama, and an artificial intelligence service that has been enabling users to transform photos of women into nude pictures, enabling abuse, blackmail and other kinds of harassment.  Potential malicious uses of deepfakes include fraud, inciting acts of violence or sowing political unrest. Last week, several Trump supporters proposed on Parler that Trump’s concession speech may have been a manipulated video. The chatter is only more evidence that the existence of deepfakes, and the lack of truly effective screening […]

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Extra Crunch roundup: 2 VC surveys, Tesla’s melt up, The Roblox Gambit, more

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Thanks very much for reading Extra Crunch this week. I hope we can all look forward to a nice, boring weekend with no breaking news alerts. Continue reading Extra Crunch roundup: 2 VC surveys, Tesla’s melt up, The Roblox Gambit, more→

Capitol Hill riot exposes Congress’s operational and cybersecurity frailties

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The violent pro-Trump mob that stormed the Capitol on Wednesday exposed not only glaring weaknesses in the legislative body’s physical security but also its digital and operational security, according to experts. The intruders were able to roam the halls of Congress and at certain points had unfettered access to some lawmakers’ offices and computers. One rioter left a note in front of a computer in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office saying, “We will not back down.” Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., said a laptop was stolen from his office. There is no public evidence that devices were tampered with. But some experts are hoping that, in addition to a likely investigation into the failures of physical security measures, lawmakers take the opportunity to review their own digital security practices, which have long been a concern. The insurrectionists who breached the Capitol were unsophisticated opportunists who were more interested in taking selfies […]

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Lawmakers want more transparency on SolarWinds breach from State, VA

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Two Democratic senators are calling on the departments of State and Veterans Affairs to brief lawmakers on how their agencies have been impacted by the SolarWinds breach. The breach, in which suspected Russian government-backed hackers backdoored a network management product called SolarWinds Orion, could have infected thousands of federal government agencies and private sector entities with malware, according to SolarWinds. And although the State Department has reportedly been compromised during the course of the supply-chain espionage operation, the department has not been forthcoming about the extent of the damage, according to Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J. “While several other cabinet agencies that are victims of this cybersecurity breach have publicly acknowledged having been attacked, to date the Department of State has been silent on whether its computer, communication and information technology systems were compromised,” Menendez wrote in a letter he sent Wednesday to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. The Department of […]

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Lawmakers throw cold water on splitting Cyber Command from NSA

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Although Pentagon officials have suggested in recent days that the nation’s offensive cyber arm should split away from the National Security Agency, Cyber Command is a long way from being ready to stand on its own, according to a bipartisan group of lawmakers. The proposal, which some DOD officials have been entertaining in the last several days, would separate out the command from the Department of Defense’s foreign signals intelligence agency, which it has been co-located with for 10 years in order to help it find its footing. Both the NSA and Cyber Command are currently run by the same leader, Gen. Paul Nakasone, and some critics say the Trump administration has been interested in separating the two in order to carve out a leadership spot for a political ally at the helm of the NSA before his time in the Oval Office expires, according to The Washington Post. But […]

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A look inside Congress’ biggest cyber bill ever

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Congress this week is slated to pass what just might be the most significant cybersecurity legislation ever. This year’s annual defense policy bill, known as the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), is loaded with provisions that would reshape the federal bureaucracy on cybersecurity. It would create a national cyber director in the White House and strengthen the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Information Security Agency (CISA), among other changes. “I believe it’s safe to say that this is the most important piece of cybersecurity legislation ever passed” should the final bill advance this week, said Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, who co-chaired the Cyberspace Solarium Commission that produced many of the proposals in the legislation. Mark Montgomery, executive director of the commission, called it “the most substantive” cyber legislation Congress will have passed. Others agree. “I think that’s true, 100%,” said Jonathan Reiber, a former Defense Department cybersecurity official during […]

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After years of work, Congress passes ‘internet of things’ cybersecurity bill — and it’s kind of a big deal

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Congress last week did something that it rarely does: It passed a meaningful cybersecurity bill. The legislation is aimed at enhancing the safeguards of internet-connected devices — also known as the internet of things (IoT) — such as smart sensors that monitor water quality or control ships in waterway locks. The bill is also a major step toward the federal government encouraging vulnerability disclosure policies that implement programs for organizations to work with security researchers to fix software flaws. “It is arguably the most significant U.S. IoT-specific cybersecurity law to date, as well as the most significant law promoting coordinated vulnerability disclosure in the private sector to date,” said Harley Geiger, director of public policy at Rapid7, a cybersecurity company. All it took to get across the finish line was more than three years of bipartisan work, encroaching state and foreign government IoT rules, a ticking legislative clock, goodwill toward […]

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Democrats furious after intelligence officials cancel in-person election security briefings

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The Office of the Director of National Intelligence on Friday said it would provide election-security information to Congress through written materials rather than in-person briefings, sparking outrage among Democrats just two months before the presidential election. In letters to the House and Senate intelligence committees, among others, Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe said his office would provide lawmakers with “written finished intelligence products” on foreign threats to the election to prevent leaks of classified information and ensure the materials aren’t “misunderstood” or “politicized.” The move highlights the partisan fight over election security material as U.S. officials warn that Russia is once again interfering in the electoral process for the benefit of President Donald Trump. After one routine election-security briefing for lawmakers in February in which an intelligence official said Russia had a preference for Trump, the president was reportedly irate that Democrats received the information before he did. Trump […]

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EARN IT Act, Facial Recognition Fail, Can I Be Phished?

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In episode 101 of our June monthly show: Scott and Tom discuss the privacy concerns with the EARN IT Act, more stories of facial recognition fail, and Scott talks about his new podcast, Can I Be Phished? ** Links mentioned on the show ** PETITION: Near… Continue reading EARN IT Act, Facial Recognition Fail, Can I Be Phished?→