U.S. Cyber-security under Major Threat

An apex FBI official cautioned that there were plenty of cyber miscreants in USA who could almost access any PC, causing such a danger that the very existence of the country could be threatened.

Deputy Assistant Director Steven Chabinsky of FBI's cyber division stated that threat on the cyber-world was of an existential type, implying that it could question the very existence of America or interpolate the nation's potency, as reported by ComputerWorld in the last week of March 2010. Also, the manner in which the country's people respond to the challenge of cyber security would determine if the best days of USA were are forthcoming or left behind, the director said.

Chabinsky conveyed an urgent and strong warning regarding cyber-threats while making a presentation at the IT trade event by FOSE government on March 23, 2010. He also suggested recommendations to beat such threats, including policies and procedures which would prevent some systems from making interlinked operations with those that are comparatively more vulnerable.

He added that if enough time, funding and motivation are provided, then a persistent miscreant will always succeed in invading a target computer.

He further said that for FBI, terrorism is the most important cyber issue after overseas nations. According to him, the threat, daily, attempts to seize intellectual property of the U.S private sector and the country's state secrets. Sometimes, the aim of the threat is to weaken the country's military and economic supremacy so that its government's stability can be undermined, the official remarked.

Experts, remarking about this problem, stated that a cyber miscreant's real ability was demonstrated through the Kneber botnet during March 2010. Reportedly, the bot hijacked 2,000 networks and over 75,000 PCs worldwide.

Ultimately, the FBI official recommended that government agencies should assess their risk position as also inquire from their security providers if their tools guarantee protection of their systems from malware and intrusions. In case that's not assured, then they should ask the reason from them.

Additionally, the official urged agencies to employ tier level of service, which limits the capability of key systems to interoperate with vulnerable ones. He also asked citizens to fulfill the civic responsibility of reporting intrusions. For FBI to be successful, assistance of the victims is must.

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» SPAMfighter News - 4/13/2010