Technorati Profile

Just how secure is North America’s infrastructure?

In the last two weeks we have read articles raising questions about: the US’ level of preparation for cyber attacks http://www.scmagazineus.com/National-Academy-of-Sciences-says-US-needs-cyberattack-plan/article/131653/

The North America electrical grid being susceptible to hacking and to being disabled http://www.itworld.com/security/66057/report-cybercriminals-have-penetrated-us-electrical-grid?source=nlt_wrapup

And a startling example of a state government having personal data stolen for over one million state residents http://www.scmagazineus.com/Unencrypted-laptop-with-1-million-SSNs-stolen-from-state/article/131333/

In response we have seen: a tug of war over control over cyber security between  the White House and the Department of Homeland Security http://www.scmagazineus.com/Policymakers-debate-White-Houses-role-in-cybersecurity/article/131513/, the Electronic Frontier Foundation raising concerns about growing US government power over Internet access and privacy http://www.securitypronews.com/insiderreports/insider/spn-49-20090423TimeToPutTheBrakesOnTheCybersecurityAct.html

a federal bill introduced to shore up security of the electrical grid http://www.scmagazineus.com/Planned-legislation-to-protect-power-grid/article/131596/ , and the FBI stating that cybercrime is now one of their top three priorities http://www.scmagazineus.com/RSA-Law-enforcement-cybercrime-successes/article/131299/

One would hope North America’s ability to identify and mitigate cyber threats would be as fast and efficient as apparently we were to the sudden appearance of the Swine Flu.

Ron Lepofsky ERE Information Security Auditors www.ere-security.ca May 1, 2009

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 6th, 2009 at 1:19 pm and is filed under Security Postings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.