Government Information Security Podcast

Privacy, data security and consumer protection - three of the top concerns to organizations everywhere. And they are three of the topics nearest and dearest to Lydia Parnes, former director of the Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) Bureau of Consumer Protection.

Now a partner in the Washington, D.C. office of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, Parnes works with organizations to ensure their privacy and security policies. In an exclusive interview, Parnes discusses:

Parnes' current practice focuses on privacy, data security, Internet advertising, and general advertising and marketing practices.

The former director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection (BCP) at the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), she is a highly regarded expert in the field of consumer protection. As director of the BCP, one of the FTC's two law-enforcement bureaus and the nation's only federal consumer-protection agency, Parnes oversaw the enforcement of a wide range of laws designed to prevent fraud and deception in the commercial marketplace, safeguard consumer privacy, and provide consumers with important information about the goods and services they purchase. She also represented the bureau in international settings and on Capitol Hill in connection with such high-profile issues as information security and privacy, Internet advertising, and identity theft. In addition, Lydia has extensive experience with the application of consumer-protection principles to the technology market. In 2006, she served as the deputy executive director of the President's Task Force on Identity Theft, coordinating the efforts of 17 federal agencies in developing a national strategic plan to combat identity theft in both the private and public sectors.

James Lewis likens the Internet to the Wild West, an untamed environment with few restraints to inhibit innovation. It's a popular vision held by many in business and government, an impression that Lewis - senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies - believes puts cyberspace at risk.

"I just heard somebody from White House say that we want cyberspace to be unrestrained and uncontrolled, and to be like the Wild West because the Wild West was best for innovation and we need to keep the free and untrammeled Internet to allow for continued innovation. And, the Internet community would itself eventually come up with the solution to cybersecurity." said Lewis, who also serves as project leader for the Center's Commission on Cybersecurity for the 44th Presidency, which produced a report 13 months ago that served as a roadmap for the Obama administration in developing its cybersecurity policy.

Lewis, in an interview with GovInfoSecurity.com, said that idea that the unrestrained Internet community would develop solutions to battle digital threats is outdated. Indeed, he said, he was in that camp, and in 1996 wrote a White House report cautioning against regulating the Internet. "It's been 14 years, and it hasn't happened; it's time to move on," Lewis said.

Limited regulation won't stifle creativity; just look at other industries such as automotive in which innovations continue despite rules requiring drivers and passengers to wear seatbelts, he said.

In the second of a two-part interview, conducted by GovInfoSecurity.com's Eric Chabrow, Lewis also discussed the:

In Part 1 of the interview, Lewis graded President Obama's first-year cybersecurity performance and addressed the expected evolution of the White House cybersecurity adviser's job and the challenges confronting the new cybersecurity coordinator, Howard Schmidt. He also explained why he feels the federal government must take the lead in securing America's key digital assets, despite the fact that much of the nation's critical IT infrastructure is owned by business.

As a senior fellow at CSIS, a public-policy research group, Lewis conducts writes on technology, national security and the international economy. Before joining CSIS, he worked as a foreign service officer and as a member of the senior executive service. His assignments involved Asian regional security, military intervention and insurgency, conventional arms negotiations, technology transfer, foreign investment and the defense industry, sanctions, internet policy, and military space programs.

Imagine James Lewis as Barack Obama's teacher and it's report-card time. How well did Obama do in Lewis' class?

"I'd probably give him a B, B-plus," said Lewis, senior fellow for technology and public policy program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the public policy group that hosted the Commission on Cybersecurity for the 44th Presidency, in which he served as project director.

Think of the commission's report as the primary textbook Obama and his aides studied in preparation for the president's first big cybersecurity test: the issuance last May of the administration's Cyberspace Policy Review, the map the White House is following as it tackles cybersecurity challenges. What prevented the president from getting an A? The commission report proposed a more higher-ranking Office of Cyberspace director than the cybersecurity coordinator Obama eventually appointed.

"The issue that the people have fixated on has been the cyber coordinator at the White House, and that's interesting to watch it play out," Lewis said in the first of a two-part interview with GovInfoSecurity.com. "Not encouraging, but at other agencies there's been a lot of activity, and we can't necessarily see the results right now, but the DoD, the DHS - the Homeland Security Department, even at State, we're beginning to see people do things. I'd give him a pretty good grade."

In the interview, conducted by GovInfoSecurity.com's Eric Chabrow, Lewis also discusses:

In Part 2 of the interview, Lewis discusses the continuing work being conducted by the commission, which is addressing identity management and situational awareness, and the roadblocks Congress faces in enacting meaningful cybersecurity legislation this year.

As a senior fellow at CSIS, Lewis conducts research and writes on technology, national security and the international economy. Before joining CSIS, he worked as a foreign service officer and as a member of the senior executive service. His assignments involved Asian regional security, military intervention and insurgency, conventional arms negotiations, technology transfer, foreign investment and the defense industry, sanctions, internet policy, and military space programs.

Lewis received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago and has authored more than 40 publications on a range of topics since coming to CSIS, including: Assessing the Risks of Cyber Terror and Cyber War, Strengthening Law Enforcement Capabilities for Counter-Terrorism and Globalization and National Security.

This is the prediction of David Foote of Foote Partners, the FL-based consultancy that tracks IT skills and competencies. In a look ahead at 2010 and beyond, Foote discusses:

Foote has long been one of the nation's leading industry analysts tracking, analyzing and reporting on IT workforce management and compensation practices, trends and issues. His columns, articles and contributions appear regularly in dozens of publications.

As Foote Partners' CEO and Chief Research Officer since 1997, David leads a senior team of experienced former McKinsey & Company, Gartner, META Group, and Towers Perrin analysts and consultants, and former HR, IT, and business executives, in advising governments and corporations worldwide on increasing performance and managing IT's impact on their businesses and customers.

Prior to co-founding Foote Partners in 1997, David was an analyst and consultant with Gartner and META Group, co-founding and directing META's executive service for Chief Information Officers and leading the firm's IT Human Capital Management and Compensation research practices.

Reitinger, deputy undersecretary of the Department of Homeland Security's National Protection and Programs Directorate and director of the National Cybersecurity Center, says the only purpose of Einstein is to protect government networks.

"To that end, it is not our intention to go out and seek things like personally identifiable information," Reitinger said in the second of a two-part interview with GovInfoSecurity.com. "Our intent is instead, say, what constitutes an attack? What is malicious traffic? And when we see something that is malicious traffic, that is an attempt to compromise a government system, and quite conceivably impair the privacy of Americans who data is held or the people who are working on those government systems, that we can detect that and stop it, and do a better job of actually protecting privacy."

Besides Einstein, other subjects Reitinger addressed in the interview conducted by GovInfoSecurity.com's Eric Chabrow included:

In Part 1 of the interview, Reitinger discussed the need to develop innovative, collaborative approaches to meet the human resources needs to safeguard government systems and how much risk the government faces by not having a sufficient number of cybersecurity professionals.

Before his appointment in March, Reitinger served as chief trustworthy infrastructure strategist at Microsoft, where he was responsible for helping improve the protection and security of the nation's critical IT infrastructure. This role allowed him to coordinate closely with government agencies and private partners on cybersecurity protection programs to build trustworthy computing systems worldwide.

Reitinger also served as a member of the Federal Emergency Management Agency National Advisory Council, where he advised the FEMA administrator on aspects of cybersecurity related to emergency management. FEMA is part of DHS. He is an expert on computer crime and policy, and previously served as the executive director of the Defense Department's Cybercrime Center, charged with providing electronic forensic services and supporting cyber investigative functions department-wide. Before joining DoD, Reitinger served as deputy chief of the Computer Crime and Intellectual Property division at the Justice Department.

Reitinger holds a law degree from Yale Law School and a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering and computer science from Vanderbilt University.

These are the headlines from the latest Cisco Annual Security Report. Patrick Peterson, Cisco senior fellow, offers highlights of the report, discussing:

Peterson, Chief Security Researcher, is also a Cisco Fellow -- a position that is reserved for individuals whose technical contribution has made a material impact not only within Cisco, but also in the industry as a whole. As a security technology evangelist, Peterson leads research projects to understand cutting-edge criminal attacks and business models and developing the technologies to combat them. Peterson chairs the technical committee for the Messaging Anti-Abuse Working Group (MAAWG) and the authentication committee for the Authentication and Online Trust Alliance. He is a frequent speaker at industry conferences, including RSA, Gartner, Networkers and AusCe

Ron Gula, CEO of Tenable Network Security, explains the threat and the challenges to mitigating it. In an exclusive interview, Gula discusses:

The growing role of the Department of Homeland Security in governing federal cybersecurity has its limits, says Mischel Kwon, who until this summer served as director United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team, the DHS agency that analyzes cyber threats and vulnerabilities in federal networks, disseminates cyber threat warnings information and coordinates national incident response activities.

Some lawmakers seek to give DHS additional authority, including the coordination of cybersecurity initiatives and review other agencies IT security budgets, but Kwon - now vice president of public sector security solutions at the security firm RSA - says that would be unadvisable.

"DHS has lot on plate right now in regards to cybersecurity. It's a new department and has a lot of growing and maturing to do, and I'm not sure it's the right thing to put all eggs in one basket," Kwon, now a vice president at the security firm RSA, said in an interview with GovInfoSecurity.com.

Besides, Kwon said, various departments and agencies already have cybersecurity expertise in their areas, and the government should exploit that know-how through better coordination. "We already have relationships and intellectual knowledge in each one of these departments and agencies, and I think it's important that we understand how we collaborate as a government to make this work instead of setting up one silo entity to be cyber," Kwon said. "Just taking everything and dumping into DHS is actually going to hurt the cause."

Other topics addressed by Kwon in the interview:

Kwon was interviewed by GovInfoSecurity.com's Eric Chabrow.

Kwon joined RSA in August. She headed U.S.-CERT from June 2008 to August 2009. previously, she served as chief IT security technologist within the Justice Department as well as its acting deputy director of IT security. Since 2006, she has served as an adjunct professor of cyber defense and leads the Cyber Defense Lab at George Washington University.

She earned a master in computer science from Marymount University and a master certificate in information assurance from George Washington University.

A renowned expert in secure systems and design, Ranum, currently the CSO of Tenable Network Security, offers a new look at topics such as the risks of cloud computing and what he calls the myth of cyber warfare.

In an exclusive interview, Ranum discusses:

Ranum, since the late 1980s, has designed a number of groundbreaking security products including the DEC SEAL, the TIS firewall toolkit, the Gauntlet firewall and NFR's Network Flight Recorder intrusion detection system. He has been involved in every level of operations of a security product business, from developer, to founder and CEO of NFR. Marcus has served as a consultant to many FORTUNE 500 firms and national governments, as well as serving as a guest lecturer and instructor at numerous high-tech conferences. In 2001, he was awarded the TISC "Clue" award for service to the security community, and also holds the ISSA lifetime achievement award. In 2005 he was awarded

Take, for instance, President Obama, who he praises for his cybersecurity initiatives. Wu, the Oregon Democrat who chairs the House Science and Technology's Subcommittee on Technology and Innovation, characterized the White House cybersecurity coordinator Obama wants to hire as a "eunuch," saying the position needs more authority than the president wants to give it.

Wu, who's panel shepherds legislation relating to the National Institute of Standards and Technology, has kind words for new NIST director Patrick Gallagher, but disagrees with him on the creation of a Computer Security Laboratory.

In a wide ranging interview, Wu also discusses the:

GovInfoSecurity.com's Eric Chabrow interviewed Wu.

Wu is finishing his 11th year representing Oregon's First Congressional District, which covers the northwest corner of the state, including parts of Portland. A native of Hsinchu, Taiwan, Wu is the first Chinese-American elected to the House of Representatives.

Before his election to Congress in 1998, he was a lawyer, specializing in high-tech law.

Wu holds a bachelor of science degree from Stanford University and a law degree from Yale Law School.