A secure Internet requires government participation in network security, said a top Homeland Security Department official while speaking at an industry event Nov. 4.

"The market will not solve all our problems. In no other issue does the market bear such a burden and it should not do so here," said Bruce McConnell, senior counselor to the deputy undersecretary for national protection and programs directorate. He spoke during at event sponsored by Cybersecurity Seminars in downtown Washington, D.C.

"What we need is a participatory framework in which the roles are clear, security is practicable, and accountability is enforced," McConnell added.

The private sector could be lagging in cybersecurity in part due to the absence of a policy framework that incentivizes good behavior, he said. "Cyber crime does pay, but good cybersecurity doesn't."

The extent to which government should have a role in nationwide cybersecurity requires debate, McConnell said. "Success might look more like a set of issues recognized and well framed, leading to a set of norms that enable the emergence of convention, one that is defined by action as much as discussion."

The Obama administration is working to craft its own cybersecurity bill, McConnell added. The current session of Congress has had a number of cybersecurity measures before it, but it has yet to approve such a bill, whether by itself or as part of an authorization measure.

DHS and DoD are studying a cybersecurity framework for the defense industrial base but have not finalized an approach, McConnell added.

"We are exploring different approaches and certainly we are looking at this experiment--we will be looking at this experiment--for its relevance, if at all, to other critical infrastructures," he said.

During the same event, Rob Carey, the newly appointed Defense Department deputy assistant secretary of defense for information management, said that the government needs to be cautious with the cybersecurity tools it buys.

"Collectively, DHS and DoD probably do have every tool known to man, and yet the challenge and the threat persists," he said. "No longer can we be driven by the [business development] guys...and the solution that looks really cool," he added.

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