The FISMA Focus IPD

From: ComputerWeekly.com

Private business must take the initiative in addressing cyber threats and not wait for government, according to Howard Schmidt, the former White House cyber security co-ordinator for the Obama administration.

“We did not get where we are today by waiting around for government; we have the private sector to thank for driving the evolution of the internet,” Howard Schmidt told Computer Weekly.

For example, business has demanded and deployed multiple technologies to combat phishing so that now relatively few attacks reach corporate email users, said Schmidt.

From: BBC

Hackers from China have “persistently” infiltrated the New York Times for the last four months, the US paper says.

It said the attacks coincided with its report into claims that the family of Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao had amassed a multi-billion dollar fortune.

The hackers used methods which have been “associated with the Chinese military” to target the emails of the report’s writer, the paper said.

China’s foreign ministry dismissed the accusations as “groundless”.

“To arbitrarily assert and to conclude without hard evidence that China participated in such hacking attacks is totally irresponsible,” said spokesman Hong Lei.

From: The Independent (UK)

Warning comes during a Whitehall drive for government departments to store their electronic information externally with private companies

Rob Hastings

Editor’s Note: An advance copy of National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s Notice of Inquiry on Country Code Top-level Domain (ccTLD) for the United States; Policies and Requirements is attached here.  Below is an excerpt from the Federal Register notice:

In addition, security and stability of the Internet remains a cornerstone of all United States Government (USG) Internet policy concerns. These concerns are reflected in the current contract and SOW through high-level security requirements, including a new requirement for Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC) deployment within the usTLD.