Why US “cyber-warriors” can’t do anything about Russian “cyber-meddling”
Enlarge / Admiral Michael Rogers, head of the NSA and US Cyber Command, told the Senate Armed Services Committee on February 27 that nothing the US has done has "changed the calculus" behind Russian information operations and cyber-attacks. (credit: AFP/Getty Images)
In testimony before the US Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday, National Security Agency Director and US Cyber Command Commander Admiral Michael Rogers told senators that measures taken thus far by the US government in response to the information operations, malware attacks, and network intrusions attributed to "Russian actors" had not done anything to deter further such attacks. And it's not clear that USCYBERCOM (essentially the US military's top command for network defense and offense), or the NSA for that matter, will be able to do anything soon to change that.
Russia's alleged intrusions included attempts to gain access to voter data. Thus far there's no evidence any data was modified, though some voter data was clearly accessed. The Department of Homeland Security isn't certain any of the systems were altered or compromised, but it has acknowledged that 21 states' systems had been "targeted" in some way.
Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for the Office of Cybersecurity and Communications Jeanette Manfra told NBC News in a February 8 interview that "an exceptionally small number of them were actually successfully penetrated." And yesterday, NBC News reported that seven states' voter data systems had been "compromised" in advance of the 2016 elections-compromises that have largely already been reported.
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