Category Archives: Rep. John Ratcliffe

DHS security unit makes another big hire from elsewhere in government

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The federal agency charged with protecting U.S. infrastructure — including its computer networks — has hired Daniel Kroese, the chief of staff for Republican Rep. John Ratcliffe, as a senior adviser. The National Protection and Programs Directorate (NPPD), part of the Department of Homeland Security, brings on Kroese as the Trump administration and Congress are seeking to harden U.S. cybersecurity, including its elections systems. Kroese, who announced the hire in an email to colleagues, will arrive at NPPD with close contacts throughout Congress. The move follows NPPD’s addition of Matthew Masterson, the former chairman of the Election Assistance Commission (EAC), as another senior adviser. Masterson’s role is focused on election security. It’s not clear yet what Kroese will specialize in at NPPD. “After a remarkable 4+ years, today will be my last day working for Congressman John Ratcliffe,” Kroese said in an email to colleagues. “I will soon be starting as Senior Advisor […]

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Bossert doubtful on ‘cyber moonshot,’ preferring to focus on risk management

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The problem with thinking about confronting the nation’s cybersecurity challenge in terms of a “cyber moonshot” is that it implies an end-state where the goal has been reached, White House homeland security adviser Tom Bossert said Tuesday. “The call to go to the moon had a clearly measurable end point,” just as do other analogies — for example eradicating a disease — he told reporters Tuesday on the sidelines of the Palo Alto Networks’ Ignite federal cyber conference. “In the cyber space, I think it’s going to be a more appropriate analogy to employ a risk-management set of terminology, the idea being that you will always have to manage that risk and mitigate it.” Cyberthreats wouldn’t end, Bossert pointed out, even if there was a game-changing national achievement such as that posited by the moonshot’s supporters.  The concept has been used with increasing frequency recently to describe a proposal for a huge national effort to […]

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Rep. Ratcliffe pushes to define ‘cyber moonshot’ goals

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The United States needs to carefully define the goal of a “cyber moonshot” before embarking on a national mission to make the internet safe, Rep. John Ratcliffe said Tuesday. The original moonshot “wasn’t easy to do, but it was easy to define,” he said at an event hosted Tuesday by Palo Alto Networks. “Before we work towards our own cyber moonshot, we need to define the objectives of that moonshot with great precision and clarity.” Ratcliffe, R-Texas, is chairman of the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection, and the author of several cybersecurity bills. The cyber moonshot is an analogy that has been used with increasing frequency to describe a proposal for a huge national effort to secure the digitally connected world. At a meeting earlier this month at a federal telecommunications advisory panel, a number of leading government scientists debated its usefulness. “I don’t mean to […]

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Lawmakers fret over proposed budget cuts to some DHS cyber programs

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During two days of hearings on Capitol Hill, lawmakers generally said they were pleased so far with Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, but several from both parties expressed concern about the impact of budget cuts on some DHS cybersecurity programs — and Kelly indicated the cuts weren’t final. Proposed cuts to the department’s Science and Technology Directorate and the planned closure of a cybercrime training college for state and local law enforcement and prosecutors were highlighted by Republican congressmen Wednesday, while Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill of Missouri complained Tuesday about the proposed reduction of grant programs that helped fund port and airport security. “Why have you cut the science and technology budget … by 20 percent?” asked Rep. John Rutherford, R-Fla., noting that the budget reductions would cause several of the department’s research laboratories and centers of scientific excellence to close. Kelly hedged. “This is obviously a work in progress, congressman,” he […]

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