As Biden officials claim responsibility for investigating the hack campaign, new evidence found this week by members of Congress, former federal officials and microsp. Has added new urgency to the search for answers.
“We’re all concerned about the massive breach of these solarwinds, and frankly, it’s not surprising to see what we’re looking for, which is that the federal government isn’t ready to deal with this kind of breach,” Sen said. Rob Portman, a Republican from Ohio, said at the hearing this week.
Amid mounting pressure, the Biden administration is still trying to speed up. Attempts by Biden employees to understand the full extent of the breach were thwarted before he took office, a senior Homeland Security official said.
“There’s a concern that things could get worse,” the former official told CNN.
Meanwhile, there are indications that officers are only scratching the surface of the scope and scale, a source familiar with the investigation said.
Speaking to reporters Wednesday, White House Press Secretary Jane Sasaki said the administration would “reserve the right to respond to any cyberattack at the time and manner of our choice,” but that the employee was “just going to their computer.” He declined to answer a question on whether he intended to raise the issue of espionage with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The computer break-ins will be a focus of the upcoming presidential briefing by the intelligence community, Pasaki added.
Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, a top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said President Biden understood the urgency of the crisis in a way that President Trump was not. “And in its early days, (it) is moving at the right pace to investigate it, so that we can re-establish its influence, give Russia the right response, and determine the best way to prevent and deter such attempts in the future.”
But when the U.S. There is little disagreement among officials as to whether the intrusion was intense, opinions about the possible response, and what it will look like, are different.
U.S. An official from CNN told CNN that the current evidence suggests that the hack still qualifies as a very practical foreign intelligence operation and falls short in cyber combat operations – an important difference that would result in any discussion about fair response options.
But he said the activity would almost certainly incur costs, the official added, adding that the cost of the arrest had to be paid, even if the attack was technically similar to foreign espionage.
Gen. Keith Alexander, a former director of the National Security Agency, told CNN that Biden has a number of policy options available to him.
Alexander said, “There is a way that you can respond by notifying individuals and by diplomatic and economic measures, which they should do,” but any reaction in cyber in physical space could be a major attack on us, and we have to defend it. Not ready. The nation is not ready for that kind of cyber engagement. ”
Alexander added that Congress must pass legislation to make threat information more easily shared with the public and private sector and to give legal immunity to companies that share that data.
“I’ve never seen this level of vacancy. It’s mind-blowing, really challenging continuity,” said a DHS official who pointed to the CISA as an example of the Trump administration’s leadership disarray. “We will have challenges in changing some of the talent.”
According to a source familiar with the situation, Rob Silvers, a partner of law firm Paul Hastings, is likely to be tapped to lead the CISA in the Biden administration. He served as Assistant Secretary of Cyber Policy at the DHS during the Obama administration, as well as in other senior roles in the department. Silver did not respond to a request for comment.
“The biggest problem is that you don’t have a confirmation secretary,” the former senior DHS official told CNN. “It really sets the tone and the way the ability to start working.”
Wells said CISA is “actively working with the transition team,” providing 14 briefings focusing on ongoing cyber incidents. “As we continue our aggressive efforts to understand and respond to this complex cyber campaign, we are committed to integrating new members of the Biden Administration into the agency,” he said in a statement to CNN on Friday.
A CISA official told CNN that given the length of time that the adversary had .com access to some of the networks, the solution would be a long process, both short-term and long-term rebuild, a CISA official told CNN.
The CISA has already provided the Biden team with ideas for the development of federal cybersecurity and to meet the challenges identified by the latest developments. Suggestions, the official said, include: funding the CISA for hunting down anti-government activity on the federal network; Deployment of new censors in federal agencies to detect inconsistent activity; And improve the visibility of cloud environments such as CloudFish365.
Consideration has also been given to creating a civic program similar to the Pentagon model that helps ensure that third-party partners meet cybersecurity standards, but that would be a long-term effort, the official said.
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