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“We are spread too thin, geographically and institutionally,” Miller said. But that is changing with this week’s confirmation of NSA Director Keith Alexander, who was given a fourth star to also head the Cyber Command.
“We are headed into a new era,” Miller said. The new command will consolidate current resources, although each service will have primary responsibility for protecting its own networks. It will have three primary missions: defense of military networks, support of military and counterterrorism operations, and support of civilian agency and industry partners as needed. “There are legal and policy questions we are attempting to address,” Miller said. “It’s not a bright red line. There are a lot of gray areas.”
Effective defense also requires integrating intelligence and offensive capabilities, because attacks and attackers must first be identified to defend against them, Miller said. This point was echoed by Navy Department Chief Information Officer Robert Carey, who said at a separate event Tuesday that DOD needed to build up its cyberattack skills.
“If you know how to attack, you can defend pretty well,” Carey said. “We currently are developing people only as defenders. That mindset has to change.” Both Miller and Carey also said that simply throwing money at the cyber problems is not an option. “We are not going to buy out way out of this challenge,” Miller said.Carey and Miller also lamented the slow pace of the federal budget process. A sophisticated device -- Miller used the iPhone as an example -- can be developed in less time than it takes DOD to create a budget for an IT system. Carey said that even with a $7.6 billion IT budget, the Navy’s cyber defense has to be cost-effective and make a business case for dollars. Tanks, airplanes and ships still play out better on than do Hill than cyber issues.
“Our cyber guys would love to have the money [currently] being spent on a destroyer,” Carey said. “But that’s not going to happen.”
Original article by: William Jackson
www.gcn.com/Articles/2010/05/12/Miller-on-Cyberwar-051210.aspx?admgarea=TC_DEFENSE&Page=1
DOD struggles to define cyber war - 1
