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Obama Forms Commission To Bolster US Cyber Security (engadget.com) 53

An anonymous reader writes: President Obama unveiled a commission of private, public and academic experts to bolster the US cyber security sector. The Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity will be co-chaired by former IBM CEO Sam Palmisano and Tom Donilon, the President's former national security adviser. Some other notable members include MasterCard CEO Ajay Banga, Microsoft Research VP Peter Lee, Uber's current (and Facebook's former) Chief Security Officer Joe Sullivan, Frontier Communications Executive Chairperson Maggie Wildrotter, and Annie Anton, chair of the School of Interactive Computing at Georgia Tech. The specific goals of the commission are to: "Raise the level of cybersecurity in both the public and private sectors, deter, disrupt, and interfere with malicious cyber activity aimed at the U.S. or its allies and respond effectively to and recover from cyber incidents."
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Obama Forms Commission To Bolster US Cyber Security

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  • by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 14, 2016 @06:07PM (#51911893)

    Don't set up your own personal e-mail server to do government business!

    • .. the need for all that security for the government but no acceptance for similar security for the people.

      And we call it democracies..

    • by Anonymous Coward

      Get Feinstein & Hillary to retire, as well as all the other anti-crypto kooks.

    • they could start by not forcing (or allowing) backdoors or weak or broken encryption on Software or Hardware....

      and beefing up the reporting requirements and penalties for security breaches that expose private and personal data would be another thing to aspire to.

      -I'm just sayin'
      • by KGIII ( 973947 )

        If we go by quantity alone, the US Government has lost more of my data than any other entity - as far as I am aware. For better or worse, my data is all over the place. I've had countless notices. I probably have a lifetime's worth of free credit monitoring which really doesn't do me a damned bit of good. Instead, I have the major credit bureaus set the flag to, "Do not issue credit." I think it was something like $10 to do that? I'm not really sure - it probably ought to be free.

        If I did want credit (somet

  • Clearly, the answer to better National Cybersecurity is to require more backdoors with special gov't keys. We know no one else will be able to use them.... /s
  • by Jonathan P. Bennett ( 2872425 ) on Thursday April 14, 2016 @06:19PM (#51911975)

    Yay, totally filled with executive types that have no actual clue about computer security. Maybe if there were actual security researchers, hackers, and programmers working on the problem... Wait, we already are working on it, and still no silver bullets.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by macs4all ( 973270 )

      Yay, totally filled with executive types that have no actual clue about computer security. Maybe if there were actual security researchers, hackers, and programmers working on the problem... Wait, we already are working on it, and still no silver bullets.

      Yeah, no shit.

      Notice that Apple wasn't invited to the party, but Macroshaft was. That oughta tell ya something...

      • That is the normal hire for all of these commissions, mostly because nepotism would be too obvious if done too often.

        • That is the normal hire for all of these commissions, mostly because nepotism would be too obvious if done too often.

          Yeah, because Apple has SUCH a reputation for being a Government Toadie. (Rollseyes)

          Nevermind Appke: I guess that must be why REAL security experts like Bruce Schneier aren't on the Commission, either.

    • by tomhath ( 637240 ) on Thursday April 14, 2016 @07:31PM (#51912309)
      Obama has what? Nine months left? This commission is nothing but a publicity stunt to try and make it look like his administration actually did something in the eight years they had.
      • Obama has what? Nine months left? This commission is nothing but a publicity stunt to try and make it look like his administration actually did something in the eight years they had.

        Um. No. The end of a two-term presidency is when a president is free to actually try to do useful things.

    • by winse ( 39597 )

      Maybe we could take the pile of bureaucrats over to the NSA and ask them to disclose which encryption/security measures have frustrated them the most, or required the largest efforts to bypass. I'm sure that there is technology that is exponents cheaper to just socially (you know just kind of take the keys through a warrant or whatever) overcome than to actually bypass. The biggest problem in systems that are built to be secure is generally social integrity not actually technology problems.

    • by mbstone ( 457308 )

      Not true that the panel is "totally filled with executive types." One of them is an executive's wife.

  • by Anonymous Coward

    The first step towards making Security better is to stop the Government from trying to make it worse.

    stop demanding that security be weakened,

    This is not only a matter of stopping efforts to require backdoors in products, but also stop secrecy around warrents for data

    How do we, or anyone else (including the people at Microsoft) know that all the the "National Security" letters that they have received from different people over the years actually came from the Government? There have been enough issues that I

  • by Snotnose ( 212196 ) on Thursday April 14, 2016 @06:31PM (#51912031)
    Seriously, they spend billions on cracking systems, zero day exploits, breaking encryption, etc. Why doesn't Obummer just say the NSA has to let manufacturers know of the defects in their products?

    Yeah yeah, I know. The NSA is all terrorists, and his new organization is all show no substance.
    • by Anonymous Coward

      Snotnose, my hat's off to you - that was a most brilliant insightful reply... better than my own even here by far -> https://yro.slashdot.org/comme... [slashdot.org]

      * Why do I say that? Heck, you are RIGHT as RAIN!

      APK

      P.S.=> Paying another "oversight committee" of stuffed shirts (who probably MIGHT know a thing or two but are vastly overpaid 'exec' types, when a real in the trenches techie would know far more imo) is dumb, especially when an AGENCY that's SUPPOSED TO DO SECURITY (not insecurity as you noted) is alrea

  • We'd be better off if instead of bolster Obama would simply re-upholster the cyber security.

    This way, the commission can sit on their asses more comfortably.

    That's why everyone is so grumpy in DC...hard asses and soft money. Time for new furniture.

  • by gavron ( 1300111 ) on Thursday April 14, 2016 @06:48PM (#51912101)

    ...is not this one. This one seeks to curtail privacy, remove encryption, punish whistleblowers, and use the Espionage Act and Treason against any and all (except their own David Petraeous and Hillary Clinton).

    Their own OPM was the subject of the worst hack of its time. http://www.computerworld.com/a... [computerworld.com]

    This administration and our government in general have NO CLUE how to protect systems, and the word 'cyber' isn't used by anyone who isn't ripping off the government for money. The word used to mean 'sex'. http://io9.gizmodo.com/today-c... [gizmodo.com]

    I have great faith that if the Obama Administration wanted to do something useful that they would have come out AGAINST the Feinstein draft bill, that they would have come out against forced decryption of iPhones; that they would not charge Edward Snowded with treason, or in the alternative charge Hillary Clinton with treason.

    Absent all those, this is hardly more than pissing in the wind.

    E

  • ok, seriously, this is a list of people who know appear to know security to someone who doesn't but they really are a group of all the wrong people.

  • by Dega704 ( 1454673 ) on Thursday April 14, 2016 @08:01PM (#51912457)
    If they want us to believe they actually care about cyber security, the first thing they can do is stop certain 3 letter agencies from waging war on it.
  • I am not sure multinational ex-CEOs have any clue about security.
  • He drew a red line in the cyber sand. That'll show them!

  • . . . . .this OTHER Slashdot headline on Federal Cybersecurity [slashdot.org]. Yep. Our vaunted Federal Cyber efforts are WORSE that pretty much everyone else, except maybe that guy who "rm -rf."-ed his hosting business [independent.co.uk]. . . .

Understanding is always the understanding of a smaller problem in relation to a bigger problem. -- P.D. Ouspensky

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