[ISN] White House releases new infrastructure security directive

From: InfoSec News (isn@private)
Date: Fri Dec 19 2003 - 05:42:40 PST

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    Forwarded from: William Knowles <wk@private>
    
    http://www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,88389,00.html
    
    By Dan Verton 
    DECEMBER 18, 2003
    COMPUTERWORLD
    
    WASHINGTON -- The White House yesterday released the long-awaited
    rewrite of a 1998 document that established critical-infrastructure
    protection, including cybersecurity, as a core policy of the U.S.  
    government. But two prominent senators from opposite sides of the
    political aisle disagree on the new policy's direction.
    
    Homeland Security Presidential Directive-7 (HSPD-7) replaced
    Presidential Decision Directive-63, signed on May 22, 1998, by
    then-President Bill Clinton, as the main document outlining the
    public/private partnership needed to eliminate major vulnerabilities
    to the nation's critical physical and cyberinfrastructures.
    
    Computerworld first revealed the pending rewrite on Nov. 7 
    (see story) [1]. 
    
    The new document is titled "Critical Infrastructure Identification,
    Prioritization and Protection." It calls for a concerted
    public/private effort to identify and catalog the nation's most
    critical infrastructure facilities and networks using geospatial
    imaging systems and requests detailed modeling and simulation studies
    to learn more about the potential effects of terrorist attacks against
    these infrastructures.
    
    The HSPD-7 gives the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS)  
    another year to "outline national goals, objectives, milestones, and
    key initiatives," even though a cybersecurity plan released in
    February envisioned that such work would be done much sooner.
    
    Senate Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Susan Collins (R-Maine)  
    praised the administration for the directive. "In the post-9/11 world,
    we cannot afford weak links in our critical infrastructure protection
    or gaps in our support for local first responders," she said.
    
    But presidential candidate Sen. Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.), the
    ranking Democrat on the committee, lambasted Bush for allowing the DHS
    to take more time to put together yet another plan.
    
    "This nation has been desperately in need of leadership to protect its
    critical infrastructure from terrorist attack," said Lieberman. But
    "the president has given Secretary Ridge yet another year to develop a
    'plan' to develop a 'strategy' to identify, prioritize and protect key
    critical infrastructures," he added.
    
    "This would almost be laughable were it not such a devastating failure
    for our country," Lieberman said. "The administration has repeatedly
    assured us it was at work on such plans and strategies. Now, we
    discover the administration has been running in place, leaving us no
    closer to having meaningful protections for the vital systems and
    assets the country depends upon each day."
    
    [1] http://www.computerworld.com/governmenttopics/government/policy/story/0,10801,86956,00.html
     
    
    
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