10 Dec 15. Four new Cyber Operations Squadrons to step up cyber security in US. The US will open four Cyber Operations Squadrons in Virgina, Michigan, Idaho and Texas in order to enhance its focus on cyber security.
In addition to the four squadrons to be operated by the National Air Guard under the US Air Force, the country will have seven cyber units under the army.
The plan is to establish 13 cyber units across 23 states by the end of fiscal year 2019.
The seven new Army Guard Cyber Protection Teams (CPTs) will be activated across Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, and Wisconsin.
Four CPTs are already existing in California, Georgia, Indiana, Maryland, Michigan and Ohio.
A cyber Information Surveillance Reconnaissance squadron will be set up in California and a cyber ISR group in Massachusetts.
Air National Guard Readiness Center Space and Cyber Warfare Operations Division chief Col. Kelly Hughes said: “This is the beginning.
“This is a massive amount of force structure the Guard has laid into this mission, but this is just the first layer.”
Employing 70 personnel, each Cyber Operations Squadron will protect critical infrastructure in the US against increasing cyber attacks. In April, it was discovered that the email systems of the White House and the State Department were hacked. In July, a secret email system used by the Joint Chiefs of Staff was violated.
The Syrian Electronic Army claims to have hacked the US Army’s main website and the Islamic State’s Cyber Caliphate boasts of breaking into social-media sites of US Central Command, according to the National Guard Association of the United States.
Michigan Governor Gov. Rick Snyder said: “Cyber-attacks are an unfortunate reality of a world that is becoming increasingly more dependent on technology.
“The new cyber unit will help ensure we remain on the forefront of this mission and provide new and future opportunities for growth.” (Source: airforce-technology.com)
09 Dec 15. Cyber War Pre-emption Is The Key to Defense. The United States’ best defense against a crippling cyber attack could be a more visible offense, military leaders and other experts recently suggested at the Army War College in Carlisle. Then they stopped talking.
The nation’s cyber attack capabilities are so cloaked in secrecy that they could not say anything specific in an unclassified forum — even an invitation-only, closed-door strategy session.
That mystery could be a problem for deterring adversaries, says Mark Troutman, a participant in the forum and director of the Center for Infrastructure Protection and Homeland Security at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va.
“If you want a deterrent effect, the capability has to be known,” Troutman said, “and there has to be the perception that the resolve is there to use it.”
Or as Dr. Strangelove put it in Stanley Kubrick’s Cold War thriller: “The whole point of the doomsday machine is lost if you keep it a secret. Why didn’t you tell the world, eh?”
Increasingly, top security officials worry about computer attacks that could shut down the nation’s systems for energy, banking, communications and more. A computer problem last month — which might or might not have been triggered by Anonymous hackers — closed the New York Stock Exchange for more than three hours.
Many former Cold War warriors believe prevention should start with the computer-age equivalent of nuclear deterrence and a promise of mutually assured destruction.
“The deterrence issue here is harder,” said Paul Kaminski, chairman of the Defense Science Board. “We have to give this more thought. As complicated as nuclear deterrent was, this is more complicated because there’s less clarity in the actions.”
He and some others interviewed for this story were not at the war college talks.
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