BBC Online :
The deputy director of the US National Security Agency (NSA), Richard Ledgett, has warned of the increasing danger of destructive cyber attacks by states.
He told the BBC: “If you are connected to the internet, you are vulnerable to determined nation-state attackers.”
He said nations would need to identify red lines that should not be crossed.
He also said agency targets, numbered in “the high hundreds”, had discussed leaks by contractor Edward Snowden, with some changing their behaviour.
Richard Ledgett’s office on the eighth floor of NSA headquarters at Fort Meade is filled with exhibits on the history of code-making and breaking, ranging from American Civil War systems through a German Enigma machine adapted for use with Japan.
There is even an encryption device recovered from the wreckage of the Challenger Space Shuttle.
But it is modern challenges in cyberspace which are now at the heart of the NSA’s dual mission of protecting sensitive government communications and collecting intelligence on America’s adversaries.
‘Case-by-case basis’
In cyberspace, Mr Ledgett said the agency was seeing a shift to more destructive attacks – such as those that hit Sony last year or Saudi Aramco in 2012 – as well as more aggressive postures by nation states.
“The barrier to entry is going down… and as everybody in the world becomes more connected with computers and information systems, the vulnerabilities are going up,” he told the BBC.
Improving defences and identifying the most sensitive data is one important way of dealing with threats. But nations also need to do more to identify clear red lines that, if crossed, will lead to consequences, he said.
Those consequences could take the form of actions within cyberspace itself, where the NSA’s number two said that the US military’s cyber-command was prepared to conduct offensive cyber operations in other peoples networks.
The deputy director of the US National Security Agency (NSA), Richard Ledgett, has warned of the increasing danger of destructive cyber attacks by states.
He told the BBC: “If you are connected to the internet, you are vulnerable to determined nation-state attackers.”
He said nations would need to identify red lines that should not be crossed.
He also said agency targets, numbered in “the high hundreds”, had discussed leaks by contractor Edward Snowden, with some changing their behaviour.
Richard Ledgett’s office on the eighth floor of NSA headquarters at Fort Meade is filled with exhibits on the history of code-making and breaking, ranging from American Civil War systems through a German Enigma machine adapted for use with Japan.
There is even an encryption device recovered from the wreckage of the Challenger Space Shuttle.
But it is modern challenges in cyberspace which are now at the heart of the NSA’s dual mission of protecting sensitive government communications and collecting intelligence on America’s adversaries.
‘Case-by-case basis’
In cyberspace, Mr Ledgett said the agency was seeing a shift to more destructive attacks – such as those that hit Sony last year or Saudi Aramco in 2012 – as well as more aggressive postures by nation states.
“The barrier to entry is going down… and as everybody in the world becomes more connected with computers and information systems, the vulnerabilities are going up,” he told the BBC.
Improving defences and identifying the most sensitive data is one important way of dealing with threats. But nations also need to do more to identify clear red lines that, if crossed, will lead to consequences, he said.
Those consequences could take the form of actions within cyberspace itself, where the NSA’s number two said that the US military’s cyber-command was prepared to conduct offensive cyber operations in other peoples networks.
