What’s New This Week:
Pentagon’s Cyber (In)Security Revealed
It was another stormy week—literally and figuratively speaking. Hurricane Michael hit the Florida Panhandle and earned the title of one of the most vicious storms at landfall in U.S. history. NASA’s cameras outside the International Space Station were able to capture details of the fast-moving hurricane.
Another storm was brewing at the Pentagon, which dominated the headlines after a government watchdog revealed that the Defense Department hasn’t done enough to protect its critical weapons systems from cyberattacks. The Government Accountability Office asked to assess the cybersecurity of the Pentagon’s $1.66 trillion major weapons systems program and found several vulnerabilities that left officials scrambling, according to GAO’s newly released report.
Simply taking steps to prevent future vulnerabilities isn’t enough, GAO said. A lack of skilled cybersecurity professionals is a real problem for the Defense Department and the agency will have to find other ways to ensure security flaws are fixed before reaching the field. Because cybersecurity talent is in short supply, expect agencies facing similar challenges to start sharing skilled personnel across organizations. BGOV’s Chris Cornillie explains more in this week’s exclusive story.
Speaking of shared resources, things aren’t looking too great for the federal government’s civilian computer networks either. The National Cybersecurity Protection System has detected only 1 percent of cyber incidents since April 2017, the Office of Management and Budget recently found. Ron Johnson, chair of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, cited the data during a hearing last week and criticized federal agencies for their inability to protect data and networks.
Meanwhile, federal agencies are scrambling to meet Homeland Security’s Oct. 16 deadline to implement the Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting and Conformance protocol, known as DMARC. The directive was issued nearly 12 months ago to tighten email security. Despite all the hype surrounding DMARC adoption, there are major concerns that implementing it will give agencies a false sense of security.
On a related note, there is some good news on the federal authentication front. The government is deploying two-factor authentication for federal agency dot-gov domains. That means federal and state employees in charge of government websites will soon be required to access their administrative accounts using the method.
We can’t argue with the benefits of adding an extra layer of security! There’s more news where that came from, so keep reading…
