IP: GOVNET: A secure telecom network for government use.

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

> Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2001 15:13:29 -0700
> To: farber () cis upenn edu
> From: Ari Ollikainen <Ari () olteco com>
> Subject: GOVNET: A secure telecom network for government use.
>
>         It didn't take long...there's security in isolation.
>
> White House asks companies for help with new government computer network
>
> http://www.siliconvalley.com/cgi-bin/printpage/printpage.pl
> Posted at 1:43 p.m. PDT Wednesday, Oct. 10, 2001
>
> WASHINGTON (AP) -- After one day on the job, the president's
> cyberspace security adviser asked computer companies Wednesday to
> help design a new secure telecommunications network for government
> use.
>
> Richard Clarke said he wants the network, called GOVNET, to be
> separate from the Internet to keep it safe from hackers or terrorists.
>
> Government agencies would use GOVNET for voice and data
> communications, and possibly for videoconferences presidential
> advisers have used since the Sept. 11 attacks.
>
> ``Planning for this network has been going on for several months,''
> Clarke said in a memo to the industry.
>
> The nation's counterterrorism chief for more than a decade, Clarke
> has pressed private industry to increase computer security by
> improving its own products.
>
> ``We'll be working even more with them in the future, to secure our
> cyberspace from a range of possible threats, from hackers to
> criminals to terrorist groups, to foreign nations, which might use
> cyber war against us,'' Clarke said Tuesday when his new job was
> announced.
>
> From his previous post at the National Security Council, he warned
> that America's fledgling Internet was vulnerable to a ``digital Pearl
> Harbor'' that could badly disrupt communications.
>
> Those warnings were echoed Wednesday on Capitol Hill, where experts
> told Congress that part of the problem is that current computer
> systems were not designed with security in mind.
>
> ``Security cannot be easily or adequately added on after the fact and
> this greatly complicates our overall mission,'' Purdue University's
> Eugene Spafford said. ``The software and hardware being deployed
> today has been designed by individuals with little or no security
> training, using unsafe methods, and then poorly tested.''
>
> The government relies on all types of technology companies -- for
> personal computer software to public telephone networks.
>
> Recent independent reviews have shown computers at many government
> agencies are open to a hacker attack. In theory, GOVNET would be
> impervious to outside assault -- particularly from lone young
> hackers, the most common Internet attacker.
>
> The chairman of the House Science Committee, Rep. Sherwood Boehlert,
> said research and development on computer security has not kept pace
> with growing threats.
>
> ``To put it simply, we need more people to be doing more creative
> thinking about computer security. That's what our adversaries are
> doing,'' said Boehlert, R-N.Y.
>
> University of Virginia professor William A. Wulf said that because
> not enough government money is spent on computer security research,
> experts tend to be conservative. ``Out of the box thinking in an area
> of scarce resources doesn't get funded,'' he said.
>
> The GOVNET proposal could cost billions of dollars.
>
> The government wants the network up and running six months after a
> contractor is picked, although there is no deadline for the contract
> to be awarded.
>
> ``A system like this can help us break through the cloud of the
> Internet and provide a separate network where the integrity of
> government information can be protected,'' said Sen. Robert Bennett,
> R-Utah, a leader on computer security issues.
>
> Many parts of the government, including the CIA and the Defense
> Department, operate separate classified networks. Mark Rasch, a
> former Justice Department computer crimes prosecutor, said those
> networks could be expanded and integrated to form GOVNET.
>
> An additional challenge is that GOVNET would have limited value
> because it could not access the World Wide Web.
>
> A better way, Rasch suggested, might be to improve the ways sensitive
> information is encrypted and sent over public networks such as the
> Internet.
>
> ``We're not building new highways so we can move tanks and troops
> from one place to another,'' Rasch said. ``We build the highways so
> they can handle the transfer of both cars and trucks and, if
> necessary, tanks and troops.''
>   _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
>   You can't depend on your judgement when your imagination is out of focus.
>                                                           -- Mark Twain.
>   _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
>
>         OLTECO                    Ari Ollikainen
>         P.O. BOX 20088            Networking Architecture and Technology
>         Stanford, CA              Ari () OLTECO com
>         94309-0088                415.517.3519


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