Competing forces continue to complicate the information security budget conversation, as high profile breaches (Sony, RSA) continue to eat up newsprint while at the same time difficult economic operating conditions continue to drive all technology managers to try to do more with less.
DHS Security Immigrations and Customs Enforcement incorrectly knocked out some 84,000 web sites attempting to seize domain names associated with child pornography, then glossed over the fact that it happened.
Security Awareness Programs can be a daunting task. It is not atypical to try to mix security awareness programs with some element of fun, such as humor with a message.
In what could be the first act of domestic terrorism since Timothy McVeigh, a small plane (Piper) that set out from Georgetown Municipal Airport hit a federal office building housing the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) at 11:36 AM in Austin, Texas. A software developer, Joseph Andrew Stack, who had previously set his house on fire, was the pilot who suicidally flew his plane Kamikaze style into the building in an apparent act of revenge against the IRS as detailed in a 3,202 word suicide note on his web site: http://embeddedart.com.
Tahaya Buchanan, a 39 year old continued working for the Atlanta office of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration services (USCIS), part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, while a fugitive wanted in Essex County, New Jersey for insurance fraud. It was not until yesterday that the CIS office in Atlanta became aware of the criminal charges, despite her having been arrested on July 9th and spending the subsequent week in a Georgia prison, a warrant in the National Crime Information Center system (nationwide law enforcement notification) issued on January 8th, 2008, and her pleading guilty to one charge of insurance fraud on Monday.
I have been watching an aggressive panhandler, sometimes with a second person, approach and threaten people (mostly old ladies, young girls, and tourists) at the corner of Church and Chambers Streets in New York City for the past month or so. While a nuisance, and problematic for the people he threatens, this is not terribly unusual in large cities although does seem to have become more prevalent based on what are likely a number of factors (including notably a down economy and a change in police enforcement). The problem in this case though, is that an NYPD police officer directs traffic at this intersection every day, watches and ignores what’s happening. What I’m observing unfold plays itself out similarly in every information security department in every company on a daily basis.
The NY Times brings us the story of Rodney Bradford. He’s the 19 year old Brooklyn man whose lawyer, Robert Reuland, invoked one of the first known “Facebook alibis” in his defense of the 19 year old Bradford on what were a second set of robbery charges he was facing. Since the Facebook defense is [...]
This morning at 11am Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano addressed the nation as part of the ongoing activities around National Cybersecurity Awareness Month. This is the sixth year of this program, sponsored by the National Cyber Security Division (NCSD) of the Department of Homeland Security, in which the department advises the American people on staying safe online. This year’s theme is “Our Shared Responsibility”, reinforcing the idea that all computer users have a responsibility for protecting themselves online. The address this morning featured the ability to ask questions of the Secretary, we sent one in, and Secretary Napolitano answered it.
