• “Never underestimate the attention, risk, money and time that an opponent will put into reading traffic.”

    Robert Morris, former Chief Scientist of the US National Security Agency (NSA), National Computer Security Center, "Crypto '95 invited talks by R. Morris and A. Shamir", 1995

  • “Build-in Security: Ensure that security is considered and built into the design of new infrastructure, so that our critical assets are protected from the start and more resilient to naturally-occurring and deliberate threats throughout their life-cycle."

    Obama-Biden Plan, Agenda: Homeland Security, December 2008

  • “When will we be secure? Nobody knows for sure – but it cannot happen before commercial security products and services possess not only enough functionality to satisfy customers’ stated needs, but also sufficient assurance of quality, reliability, safety, and appropriateness for use. Such assurances are lacking in most of today’s commercial security products and services.”

    Brian Snow, Former Technical Director of the US National Security Agency (NSA), "We need Assurance", 2005

  • "Today’s systems must anticipate future attacks. Any comprehensive system – whether for authenticated communications, secure data storage, or electronic commerce – is likely to remain in use for five years or more. It must be able to withstand the future: smarter attackers, more computational power, and greater incentives to subvert a widespread system. There won’t be time to upgrade it in the field."

    Bruce Schneier, "Why Cryptography Is Harder Than It Looks", 1997

  • “In the next five years we will counter many 'hacker' attacks but we will not be safe from Nation States and other large entities”

    Brian Snow, Former Technical Director of the US National Security Agency (NSA), "We need assurance!", 1999-2008

  • “The software security industry today is at about the same stage as the auto industry was in 1930" ... "it looks fast, goes nice but in an accident you die.” ... "The major shortfall is absence of assurance (or safety) mechanisms in software. If my car crashed as often as my computer does, I would be dead by now."

    Brian Snow, Former Technical Director of the US National Security Agency (NSA), "We need assurance!", 1999-2008

  • “Consider the use of smart cards ... for especially critical functions.  Although more costly than software, when properly implemented the assurance gain is great.  The form-factor is not as important as the existence of an isolated processor and address space for assured operations – an ‘Island of Security,’ if you will.  Such devices can communicate with each other through secure protocols and provide a web of security connecting secure nodes located across a sea of insecurity in the global net.”

    Brian Snow, Former Technical Director of the US National Security Agency (NSA), "We need assurance!", 1999-2008

  • “Given today’s common hardware and software architectural paradigms, operating systems security is a major primitive for secure systems – you will not succeed without it. This area is so important that it needs all the emphasis it can get. It is the current ‘black hole’ of security.”

    Brian Snow, Former Technical Director of the US National Security Agency (NSA), "We need assurance!", 1999-2008

  • “It's not good enough to have a system where everyone (using the system) must be trusted, it must also be made robust against insiders!”

    Robert Morris, former Chief Scientist of the US National Security Agency (NSA), National Computer Security Center, "Crypto '95 invited talks by R. Morris and A. Shamir", 1995

  • “Briefly and simply, assurance work makes a user or a creditor more confident that the system works as intended without flaws, without surprises, even in the presence of malice.” … “The major shortfall is absence of assurance or safety mechanisms in software.  If my car crashed as often as my computer does, I’d be dead by now.”

    Brian Snow, Former Technical Director of the US National Security Agency (NSA), "We need Assurance", AusCERT 2008

  • “Business now relies on information infrastructures that are interlinked and interdependent… The way in which these hidden interdependencies pervade our everyday lives is staggering and, in some cases, may go unchecked for many years until an incident occurs that revels the true nature of the interdependences' impact.”

    The British Government’s Technology Strategy Board, 2008

  • "The future ability of quantum computers might be a decade or two away, their future ability to break public-key cryptography has important implications for the encryption of highly sensitive information today. For these applications, we must already design new public-key cryptosystems and one-way functions that are immune to quantum cryptanalysis."

    ARDA, Report of the Quantum Information Science and Technology Experts Panel, 2004

Resources Security bibliography Security Organisations, Projects, and Calls bibliography: US President's 60 day Cyberspace Policy Review
bibliography: US President's 60 day Cyberspace Policy Review
Full Title: Cyberspace Policy Review - Assuring a Trusted and Resilient Information and Communications Infrastructure
Organisation:

The White House Executive Office of the President
Synaptic:
  1. Synaptic Labs has been an active participant in USA Federal initiatives that have been developing a framework on game-changing technologies as called for in point 9 of the Cyberspace Policy Review's near term action plan. Read more...
  2. Synaptic Lab' global identity management (IdM) and cryptographic key management (CKM) proposal addresses point 10 in the Cyberspace Policy Review's near term action plan by offering a new game-changing identity management vision that addresses privacy and civil liberty interests within an international context.
About document:

The U.S. President directed a 60-day, comprehensive, “clean-slate” review to assess U.S. policies and structures for cybersecurity. Cybersecurity policy includes strategy, policy, and standards regarding the security of and operations in cyberspace, and encompasses the full range of threat reduction, vulnerability reduction, deterrence, international engagement, incident response, resiliency, and recovery policies and activities, including computer network operations, information assurance, law enforcement, diplomacy, military, and intelligence missions as they relate to the security and stability of the global information and communications infrastructure.
Key message

"NEAR TERM ACTION PLAN

...

9. In collaboration with other EOP entities, develop a framework for research and development strategies that focus on game-changing technologies that have the potential to enhance the security, reliability, resilience, and trustworthiness of digital infrastructure.

10. Build a cybersecurity-based identity management vision and strategy that addresses privacy and civil liberties interests, leveraging privacy-enhancing technologies for the Nation."
President's Key Message:

“From now on, our digital infrastructure — the networks and computers we depend on every day — will be treated as they should be: as a strategic national asset. Protecting this infrastructure will be a national security priority. We will ensure that these networks are secure, trustworthy and resilient.” ... "We will develop a new comprehensive strategy to secure America's information and communications networks." [Link]
Key Message: “Cyberspace touches practically everything and everyone. It provides a platform for innovation and prosperity and the means to improve general welfare around the globe. But ... great risks threaten nations, private enterprises, and individual rights ... The architecture of the Nationʼs digital infrastructure, based largely upon the Internet, is not secure or resilient.”
 
Key Message: “The United States must work actively with countries around the world to make the digital infrastructure a trusted, safe, and secure place that enables prosperity for all nations”.
 
Keywords: Identity management, IdM, USOW, policy
Websites:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/assets/documents/Cyberspace_Policy_Review_final.pdf
See also: Behavioural Trust and Identity
About the Office:

The Executive Office of the President (EOP) was created in 1939 by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The EOP has responsibility for tasks ranging from communicating the President’s message to the American people to promoting our trade interests abroad.

The Office and Science and Technology is an entity within the Executive Office of the President. Congress established the Office of Science and Technology Policy in 1976 with a broad mandate to advise the President and others within the Executive Office of the President on the effects of science and technology on domestic and international affairs. The 1976 Act also authorizes OSTP to lead interagency efforts to develop and implement sound science and technology policies and budgets, and to work with the private sector, state and local governments, the science and higher education communities, and other nations toward this end.

Last Updated on Friday, 04 June 2010 15:49
 
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