DHS takes control of DIB cybersecurity pilot

The Homeland Security Department is now in charge of a cybersecurity information sharing pilot with the defense industrial base launched by the Defense Department, DHS officials say in a Jan. 13 privacy impact assessment (.pdf).

Defense officials have credited the pilot, which began in 2011, with gains in the security of defense contractor networks, which in recent years have come under persistent attack from hackers generally assumed to be sponsored by the Chinese government.

According to the privacy impact assessment, the pilot is focused on two threat countermeasures: blocking connection requests to malicious web domains, a method known as Domain Name System sinkholing, and email filtering.

Threat signature information enabling sinkholing and filtering shared with defense contractors--including Internet service providers--now includes data collected by the DHS US-CERT, the assessment says. US-CERT, in turn, collects threat information submitted to it from federal agencies and other sources including the private sector and the federal Internet network traffic monitoring system known as EINSTEIN.

In a statement, Rep. Jim Langevin (D-R.I.), co-founder of the Congressional Cybersecurity Caucus, said he supports the transfer of responsibility from DoD to DHS, but added that an independent study has demonstrated that the pilot "has shortcomings and information sharing alone won't provide the security these networks require for threats that are quickly increasing in volume and complexity."

Congress must pass a comprehensive cybersecurity bill, he added.

For more:
- download the DIB cybersecurity pilot privacy impact assessment (.pdf)

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