Two interesting articles written by Tom Gjelten for NPR . . .
The first NPR article concerned the U.S. government's effort to "scare the bejeezus" out of U.S. CEOs. Apparently top U.S. military officials took CEOs from large U.S. corporations, gave them top-secret clearances for a day, and then showed them some of the cyberweapons the U.S. military has in store. These same military officials also showed the CEOs how they could "turn your computer into a brick." The point of the meetings was to scare the CEOs into realizing the severity of the cyberthreat they face. The meetings may have been successful: one CEO described the event as "a life-changing experience."
The second NPR article dealt with cybersecurity firms transitioning from offense to defense. Specifically, the article detailed how the cybersecurity firm Mandiant profiles hacker teams and studies patterns within APTs rather than just updating an attacked company's anti virus software. Essentially, Mandiant engages in intelligence gathering and has been able to identify specific attacker's hacking "playbook."
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As for the first NPR article, it's an encouraging sign that at least some CEOs took these dire warnings about cyberattacks to heart. Yet, as Antone Gonsalves reported for ITWorld, some CEOs are just as likely to ignore evidence that hackers have compromised their networks. In the case of the ITWorld article, 22 organizations ignored information of a China-based espionage operation that had broken into their systems. Unfortunately, it's this kind of lackluster response that makes government imposed cybersecurity standards attractive for me. If the private sector won't take this threat seriously, why should we expect that voluntary incentives will spur action? This debate over cybersecurity legislation (and the merits of a bill like the CSA) would go a lot differently if the private sector demonstrated some initiative and some ability to protect their own networks. Until that point, I have no confidence that the private sector can do it without government intervention. Meh.
That second NPR article got me thinking . . . how long until a cybersecurity firm takes the next step and actively targets hacker groups? Kinda like a hired gun, a cyber merc if you will. I have no doubt that a company like Mandiant has the technical ability to go after the people they've profiled. In fact, I bet they'd be pretty good at it. Perhaps the U.S. government could award letters of marque for cybersecurity firms going after foreign based hackers. Perhaps companies could hire these firms to respond with hack-back in "self-defense." Whatever the case, a U.S. based company doing something like that is probably illegal, but we can always change the laws . . .
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