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Lawmakers introduce bill to save top White House cyber job after Bolton eliminated it

Posted on May 15, 2018 by Sean Lyngaas

House Democrats on Tuesday introduced legislation to codify a top cybersecurity position at the White House following National Security Adviser John Bolton’s decision to eliminate the role. The bill from Democratic Reps. Jim Langevin, R.I., and Ted Lieu, Calif., would establish a National Office for Cyberspace in the Executive Office of the President – and a Senate-confirmed head of that office. That official would synchronize cybersecurity policy across agencies in much the same way that White House cybersecurity coordinator Rob Joyce was doing until he stepped down last week. Against the backdrop of Joyce’s decision to leave the coordinator role and return to the National Security Agency, a power struggle over cybersecurity leadership at the National Security Council has ensued. Bolton ultimately decided to scrap the coordinator role. An aide to Bolton emailed NSC staff on Tuesday saying the move would help cut “another layer of bureaucracy.” Politico was first to report on Bolton’s […]

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Lawmakers call for action following revelations that APT28 posed as ISIS online

Posted on May 9, 2018 by Sean Lyngaas

The world got a fresh reminder Tuesday of the difficulties associated with assigning blame for hacking – and of the consequences when a case of mistaken identity takes hold. New evidence reinforces the notion that a group dubbed the CyberCaliphate, which sent death threats to the wives of U.S. military personnel in 2015 under the banner of the Islamic State, is actually an infamous Russian-government-linked hacking group accused of meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, the Associated Press reported. Activity from the CyberCaliphate coincided with attempts by the Russian group, known as APT28 or Fancy Bear, to breach the womens’ email accounts, according to the Associated Press. The episode brings to life established links between the CyberCaliphate and APT28 in a way that no cybersecurity research did. The hacking victims were led to believe that jihadists, and not state-backed Russians, were breaching their accounts and leaving threatening messages. Amy […]

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Government’s supply chain risk is drawing more attention than ever, Capitol Hill aides say

Posted on March 28, 2018 by Zaid Shoorbajee

Supply chain risk is one of the main things keeping cybersecurity-focused government officials and partners up at night, speakers said at a conference Wednesday in Washington, D.C. The possibility of vulnerabilities being introduced into government networks through a piece of foreign-made hardware or software has spooked agencies into thinking more about how to work with vendors, congressional staffers and government security contractors said at the KNOW Identity Conference. The federal government has cracked down lately on what it sees as risks from foreign technology companies such as Kaspersky, Huawei and ZTE. The potential problems go much deeper than that, the speakers said. Vulnerabilities deep in a service’s supply chain can be difficult for either the government or the vendor to detect and can be exploited by hackers. Simply trusting vendors to do the work isn’t enough, said Nick Leiserson, legislative director for Rep. Jim Langevin, D-R.I., said. “The idea that we’re just […]

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Cyber diplomacy office at State Department would return under House-passed bill

Posted on January 17, 2018 by Chris Bing

With the passage of the Cyber Diplomacy Act in the House of Representatives, Congress took the first step Wednesday in reestablishing a State Department office that was dedicated to developing global norms for digital espionage and more. The bipartisan bill, which passed by voice vote, has garnered support from both sides of the aisle. It would codify and expand the capabilities of the Office of the Cybersecurity Coordinator, which was created in 2011 but abolished last year after Secretary of State Rex Tillerson decided to merge it with the department’s larger Bureau of Economic Affairs. Senators have shown interest in the idea of reestablishing the office, but it’s unclear if the House bill will move in that chamber. Insiders say the shuttering of the cyber office effectively downgraded the State Department’s diplomatic mission for the development of norms for cyberspace — including, for example, debating foreign governments on what should be considered a legitimate target […]

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The Wassenaar Arrangement’s latest language is making security researchers very happy

Posted on December 20, 2017 by Shaun Waterman

Security researchers are saying rewritten language that includes hacking tools in a treaty that regulates the global trade in weapons technology, saying it fixes rules that, if implemented in the U.S., would have outlawed much of the daily commerce of the cybersecurity industry. The recent agreement, reached at the annual plenary session of the Wassenaar Arrangement — a 42-nation arms control treaty to which the U.S. is a signatory — was broadly welcomed by policy makers, industry sources and security researchers. “We applaud the hard work of the U.S. interagency and our partners in industry, the research community, and foreign governments to clarify software and technology controls that could have had a negative impact on legitimate cybersecurity,” Rob Joyce, White House Cybersecurity Coordinator, told CyberScoop. The changes provide exemptions to the export control requirements the treaty imposes on hacking tools. Cyber defenders and white hat security researchers engaged in vulnerability disclosure and […]

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