Alan W. Dowd is a Senior Fellow with the American Security Council Foundation, where he writes on the full range of topics relating to national defense, foreign policy and international security. Dowd’s commentaries and essays have appeared in Policy Review, Parameters, Military Officer, The American Legion Magazine, The Journal of Diplomacy and International Relations, The Claremont Review of Books, World Politics Review, The Wall Street Journal Europe, The Jerusalem Post, The Financial Times Deutschland, The Washington Times, The Baltimore Sun, The Washington Examiner, The Detroit News, The Sacramento Bee, The Vancouver Sun, The National Post, The Landing Zone, Current, The World & I, The American Enterprise, Fraser Forum, American Outlook, The American and the online editions of Weekly Standard, National Review and American Interest. Beyond his work in opinion journalism, Dowd has served as an adjunct professor and university lecturer; congressional aide; and administrator, researcher and writer at leading think tanks, including the Hudson Institute, Sagamore Institute and Fraser Institute. An award-winning writer, Dowd has been interviewed by Fox News Channel, Cox News Service, The Washington Times, The National Post, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and numerous radio programs across North America. In addition, his work has been quoted by and/or reprinted in The Guardian, CBS News, BBC News and the Council on Foreign Relations. Dowd holds degrees from Butler University and Indiana University. Follow him at twitter.com/alanwdowd.

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Scott Tilley is a Senior Fellow at the American Security Council Foundation, where he writes the “Technical Power” column, focusing on the societal and national security implications of advanced technology in cybersecurity, space, and foreign relations.

He is an emeritus professor at the Florida Institute of Technology. Previously, he was with the University of California, Riverside, Carnegie Mellon University’s Software Engineering Institute, and IBM. His research and teaching were in the areas of computer science, software & systems engineering, educational technology, the design of communication, and business information systems.

He is president and founder of the Center for Technology & Society, president and co-founder of Big Data Florida, past president of INCOSE Space Coast, and a Space Coast Writers’ Guild Fellow.

He has authored over 150 academic papers and has published 28 books (technical and non-technical), most recently Systems Analysis & Design (Cengage, 2020), SPACE (Anthology Alliance, 2019), and Technical Justice (CTS Press, 2019). He wrote the “Technology Today” column for FLORIDA TODAY from 2010 to 2018.

He is a popular public speaker, having delivered numerous keynote presentations and “Tech Talks” for a general audience. Recent examples include the role of big data in the space program, a four-part series on machine learning, and a four-part series on fake news.

He holds a Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Victoria (1995).

Contact him at stilley@cts.today.

White House Names Cybersecurity Expert to Lead Response to SolarWinds Hack

Friday, February 19, 2021

Categories: ASCF News National Preparedness Economic Security

Comments: 0

Following Mr. Biden’s inauguration last month, Ms. Neuberger joined the National Security Council to fill the newly formed role of deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technology. She had been running the National Security Agency’s cybersecurity directorate, an arm of the spy agency established in 2019 as part of a wider effort to more closely align its offensive and defensive operations. She also led the Russia Small Group at NSA, which was tasked with preventing Russian interference in the 2018 midterm election.

The statement detailing Ms. Neuberger’s SolarWinds efforts is the most specific to date from the Biden administration on how it is attempting to grapple with the massive hack of federal systems.

On Wednesday, Messrs. Warner and Rubio welcomed news of Ms. Neuberger’s selection. “The committee looks forward to getting regular briefings from Ms. Neuberger and working with her to ensure we fully confront and mitigate this incident as quickly as possible,” they said.

Ms. Neuberger has held a series of consultations with Democrats and Republicans in Congress in her first weeks on the job about the SolarWinds breach, Ms. Horne said.

The SolarWinds hack, which compromised more than a half-dozen federal agencies including the departments of State, Commerce and Treasury, was disclosed in December when it was discovered that suspected Russian actors had compromised the update mechanism used by a little-known, Texas-based software vendor called SolarWinds Corp. to easily infiltrate the company’s customers. The hackers are believed to have entered the systems of an unknown number of private companies, likely several dozens, in the far-reaching cyber espionage campaign.

But as investigators have continued to probe the episode, the scope of the compromise has appeared to take on even larger parameters. Approximately 30% of both the private-sector and government victims linked to the hack campaign had no direct connection to SolarWinds, The Wall Street Journal reported last month.

The White House on Wednesday said it had selected a top National Security Agency official to lead the Biden administration’s response to the sprawling SolarWinds hack, a decision disclosed after growing pressure from lawmakers for more information about the breach.

Anne Neuberger, a senior official at the White House National Security Council, has been in the position since President Biden took office, but administration officials didn’t make her appointment public until Wednesday. She has been leading the handling of the hack fallout since day one of the Biden administration, said Emily Horne, an NSC spokeswoman. Officials didn't say why Ms. Neuberger’s role leading the response wasn’t disclosed sooner.

Ms. Neuberger is focused on directing federal agencies compromised in the hack toward specific remediation solutions and identifying issues in how the government has responded. She has also worked with the private sector on addressing the attack, which may include “potential executive actions underway,” Ms. Horne said, though she didn’t elaborate. Ms. Neuberger is also focused on launching a study of the SolarWinds breach to learn lessons and to prevent such incidents in the future, Ms. Horne said.

On Tuesday, Sens. Mark Warner and Marco Rubio, the Democratic and Republican leaders of the Senate Intelligence Committee, sent a letter to various federal cybersecurity leaders asking for the administration to “empower a clear leader in the United States’ response to the SolarWinds cyber breach that has affected numerous federal agencies.”

The senators also expressed agitation with the lack of details provided thus far to Congress about the hack, which current and former intelligence officials and private-sector cybersecurity experts have widely described as one of the worst hacks on record. The U.S. has blamed Russia for the hack. Moscow has denied involvement.

“The briefings we have received convey a disjointed and disorganized response to confronting the breach,” Messrs. Warner and Rubio wrote. “The threat our country still faces from this incident needs clear leadership to develop and guide a unified strategy for recovery, in particular a leader who has the authority to coordinate the response, set priorities, and direct resources to where they are needed.”

Following Mr. Biden’s inauguration last month, Ms. Neuberger joined the National Security Council to fill the newly formed role of deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technology. She had been running the National Security Agency’s cybersecurity directorate, an arm of the spy agency established in 2019 as part of a wider effort to more closely align its offensive and defensive operations. She also led the Russia Small Group at NSA, which was tasked with preventing Russian interference in the 2018 midterm election.

The statement detailing Ms. Neuberger’s SolarWinds efforts is the most specific to date from the Biden administration on how it is attempting to grapple with the massive hack of federal systems.

On Wednesday, Messrs. Warner and Rubio welcomed news of Ms. Neuberger’s selection. “The committee looks forward to getting regular briefings from Ms. Neuberger and working with her to ensure we fully confront and mitigate this incident as quickly as possible,” they said.

Ms. Neuberger has held a series of consultations with Democrats and Republicans in Congress in her first weeks on the job about the SolarWinds breach, Ms. Horne said.

The SolarWinds hack, which compromised more than a half-dozen federal agencies including the departments of State, Commerce and Treasury, was disclosed in December when it was discovered that suspected Russian actors had compromised the update mechanism used by a little-known, Texas-based software vendor called SolarWinds Corp. to easily infiltrate the company’s customers. The hackers are believed to have entered the systems of an unknown number of private companies, likely several dozens, in the far-reaching cyber espionage campaign.

But as investigators have continued to probe the episode, the scope of the compromise has appeared to take on even larger parameters. Approximately 30% of both the private-sector and government victims linked to the hack campaign had no direct connection to SolarWinds, The Wall Street Journal reported last month.

Photo: The update mechanism used by SolarWinds, based in Austin, Texas, was targeted to infiltrate the company’s customers. -  BRONTË WITTPENN/BLOOMBERG NEWS

Link: White House Names Cybersecurity Expert to Lead Response to SolarWinds Hack - WSJ

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