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>> translator: i know who you are and i saw what you did is the name to have the book. the author is lori andrews who is a professor of law at kent college of law in chicago. professor andrews, what's behind that title? >> guest: it's a amazing how much outside entities, third party institutions know about us based on our web presence. for example, 75% of human resources people in companies check your online profile before they interview you for a job. one in four college admissions officers is looking at the online profile of students before deciding about them. so your digital self may be more important than your physical self, and lots of these institutions think they know who you are, might get a misimregistration and might vim nays against you -- against you as a result. >> host: are we more willing to

put ourselves out there online than we are in person? >> guest: yes. there are some studies, in fact, that say that women are more willing to reveal things in person, but men who are notoriously close-mouthed in person actually are more revealing of themselves on the web. and if you think about it, think of the information that facebook has on over a billion people. they know your political preference, your sexual preference, who your friends are, what you like, what your dog's name is, all these sorts of things. and, in fact, one security analyst said if the government had asked you directly for that sort of information, it would have taken money, it would have taken lawyers, it might have even taken guns to get you to cough up the information. but we routinely do so on social networks. >> we also don't think about the fact that our google searches are tracked. and so i also write mystery books, i blew up the white house, so my google searches if

the fbi chose to look at them would be very incriminating. and ike looking at, you know, different date rape drugs for my mysteries. and so people may sitting there with their computer think they're engaged in some secret activity not knowing it's asthere were a big eyeball on the other end keeping track of the things that you do. and i've been shocked even since my book came out about some of the new uses of the information against you. life insurance companies are now being advised by consulting groups like deloitte that they should do away with the expensive blood and urine tests to decide whether someone merits life insurance and instead look at their social network profile. and it turns out that if you're an avid reader, if you eat fast food, if you commute to work, all those things could be used against you in life insurance. now think about it, i'm hoping there are a gazillion avid

readers out there because i write books, but the assumption is now -- not that you're reading on an exercise cycle, but that you're somehow sedentary. and a judgment is being made against you that you don't even know about. >> host: what is web lining that you talk about in your book? >> guest: well, the web lining is a judgment made about you because you're part of a group. in the 1960s there was a phenomenon called red lining where banks would actually put a red line around a part of the city where they didn't want to invest, where low income people were. now with web lining it could be any of us. one young man who had his own business, had a condo, paid off his credit card every month had his american express card lowered from there are 10,000 to $3,000 because not of anything he did, but because he'd shopped

at a place where other people were more likely not to pay off their credit cards. so it's putting you into a group and limiting your opportunities as a result of it. so if i go to a less expensive web site -- target.com as opposed to saks fifth avenue.com, and then i go to a credit card site, i may be offered a less good credit card because the notion is i, you know, i'm not worthy of it. and web lining might even be things like if a bank or an airline knows my gender, that i'm a woman, and they think, well, women are more likely to be patient and hold online when they call in for something, i might actually be web lined and put on hold for a longer period of time. now, think about that. i'm a lawyer. if i were waiting in a bank and out of order all the men were taken ahead of me, i would get

very upset. i would probably make a big fuss. but i don't even know that's occurring when it's based on something i've done on the web. >> host: who is doing that web lining, lori andrews? >> guest: well, first, we have to think about data aggregators which most people don't think of. there are companies like axiom which says it has 1600 bits of information about 96% of americans. google collects information by scanning your gmails, by looking at what you look up, by looking at what, you know, what youtube videos you watch. they have 60 different services, and they combine data, ask they make over -- and they makeover 90% of their income which is huge, over $50 billion a year, providing that information to advertisers. so web sites for credit card companies are doing web lining, the people who give out home loans are doing web lining.

it might even be as simple as if your family has entered a poorer zip code can -- any lace on a web -- place on a web site, your child may be getting ads for trade schools instead of kind of appropriate scholarship material for the ivy league. so it's any of the services that make judgments about who to go after in terms of getting benefits or taking away went fits online. >> host: professor andrews, you also talk about web beacons and web scrapers. what are they? >> guest: so there are a variety of mechanisms to find out where you go on the web. a simple one is cookies, and they started out benignly enough, you know, in amazon, you know, you agreed to do cookies so you wouldn't have to somewhere information about -- enter information about your shipping address every time and so they could send you recommendations. but then it got out of time.

there were other types of tracking mechanisms like those you henced that came up every time you would download, say, a product like adobe flash player, things like that, to keep track. i was astonished when i learned that both presidential campaigns the last time around, romney and obama's groups, put cookies and other tracking mechanisms like web beacons on your computer to see where you went on the web. did you go to a religious site, did you go to a porn site if they admitted they looked for those sort of things so they could target an individual message to you to make you more likely to vote for them. so these are tracking mechanisms. i mean, i love dictionary tom. i had no idea that when i look up a word on it, it put 233 cookies on my computer to track where i went. i think it's out of line with other rights that we have. think about it.

i have privacy rights off line, i have a right to express myself. but if data's collected and used against me, i'm losing those rights in the digital world. and when you think about it, think about the recent revelations about the nsa has ordered verizon, for example, to turn over data about our calls, who we call from where. now, the government has said, oh, that's not that much of a problem because we don't actually look at the substance of the calls. but that doesn't comport with first amendment and fourth amendment rights. i have a first amendment right to express myself and freedom to associate. but by looking at who i call, they can tell whether i'm calling occupy wall street people, the tea party, an abortion clinic, an aids clinic. the same thing by looking at my location data. and, in fact, in a supreme court case last year, the supreme court decided that your location

is private information. police need to get a warrant before they put a gps tracking device on your car, for example. and justice sotomayor pointed out that that sort of location data, which nsa is collecting from our cell phones, can reveal personal sexual, professional and other connections we have. it can tell whether we're meeting with our lover or our, you know, a competitor to our employer. it's all very sensitive information and should be protected. >> host: professor lori andrews, i know who you are and i saw what you did, is the name of the book. professor andrews, you tell the story about a kodak fiend in your book. what is that? >> guest: so this privacy issue is nothing new. you get people who say privacy's dead now that there are social networks, but i've found that every technology back 125 years

people said the same thing. so the kodak fiend in 1888 was the first portable camera. and before you had control of your image. you had to go into a studio and pose if you wanted to have your picture taken. but now when the portable camera came out in 1888, there were op-eds all around the country saying watch out for the kodak fiend, it can catch you in an uncouth position in line in the post office. think about it, it's just like tagging in facebook where your friends may put up an unflattering photo of you. and at the time people said privacy was dead, but the law caught up, and the law said, no, you have a right to not have your privacy invaded by someone, say, coming on your property and taking photos of you. doing ads with your photo in it. similarly, when other technologies came along,

wiretapping, initially the cops used it without thinking they needed to have any warrant or anything, that it didn't invade constitutional privacy rights and, ultimately, the supreme court said, no, privacy is important, we should protect it. i think, ultimately, we're going to see more privacy protection even in the social network world, perhaps even something like they have in europe where you have to be told if data's being collected against you. you have a right to know if the if vim that a story decisions are made based on your online data. you have a right to, you know, correct it. one law student, actually, in europe was able to ask facebook what information it had on him under that law. he got 1600 pdfs of information which showed facebook was collecting everything that had ever been posted about him by friends, everything he'd ever deleted. and so you can see the incredible image that people get

about you that might then come back to haunt you when you try to get a job. and it's not just, you know, drunken hot tub photos that can be used to your disadvantage. one woman who sued her employer after she had a workplace accident that caused her to need several spinal surgeries, have pins put in her neck was denied a right to sue by a individual who said, oh, no, you're smiling in your photo on your social network. you couldn't have been that badly hurt. or in divorce cases if a woman puts up a sexy photo of herself, the judge in some cases has taken away custody of the child without asking how's the mom really treating her child? so you have these crazy divorce cases going on. in one the judge was trying to decide whether he should take custody from a husband who said he liked a violent video in

which ronald mcdonald shot burger king in the face. and millions of people have liked that video. finish -- so everything you say and do on the web can be used against you. so, and unlike vegas, what happens in facebook doesn't stay in facebook. >> host: you write: courts are abdicating their responsibility to protect individuals when they reason that you can't expect privacy on the internet since nothing on the web is safe from someone with hacking skills or data aggregation agenda. >> guest: so courts have forgotten the basic premises about why privacy is important. privacy is important because we develop relationships with people by parceling out information, you know? when we're close to someone, they know more information. we are able to have our freedom of association by not potentially letting everybody

know what church or mosque or synagogue we attend. and yet courts seem to mistakenly think that just because a hacker could potentially find out what we're doing online privacy can't be protected, that's wrong. someone could steal my mail out of my mailbox, but yet we protect the privacy in letters. just because i walk through a part of the city where rape is more common, we don't say, oh, she's not protected against rape, you know, just because someone could do something. dangerous doesn't mean it's worth giving -- doesn't mean we should give can up our privacy rights. another way that courts are abdicating their responsibilities is by accepting at face value what they find on facebook or myspace pages. usually courts have to say, determine whether something's relevant to the case, determine whether it's authentic.

but now we have this crazy thing where spouses are in anticipation of a divorce making up facebook pages for the other spouse and putting horrible things on it so it will be more likely they'll get custody. and judges aren't looking closely enough about whether that post was authentically made by the ex-husband or was a ruse of the ex-wife. not looking at things whether a certain, you know, photo means someone will be a bad parent or not. employers are not saying what are the skills of the person. 0% of -- 30% of employers say they will turn down someone who has a drink in their hand on a face bebook page -- facebook page. even an innocent drink at a wedding reception. so we're seeing this sort of failure to figure out that there's more to people than just what they post. >> host: how does your book tie into your work as a law professor? >> guest: i teach a course on

the law of social networks, but also i'm involved in pro bono cases and advising government agencies and, you know, various groups about their rights and working with legislatures. and so i have a sort of great band of research assistants who are students who have, you know, sort of what -- put their online reputations on the line by doing lots of work in this area, actually contacting data aggregators to see what information they have about them, doing things like using the homeland security forbid withen words and seeing what wht happens. we see a lot of expense now, in the hundreds of billions of dollars, on the part of government to track us. but some of it is ludicrous. homeland security has 350 words today look at in e -- they look at in e-mails. one of them is guzman because

he's a drug lord. but it then sweeps in anybody else who has that last name. one term they look for is organized crime. now, how useful is that? is it truly likely that a mob leader would sign an e-mail, love tony, organized crime? so we're seeing some approaches that cost a lot of money, put privacy at risk and aren't even, don't even make sense. >> host: lori andrews, who knows more about us, the federal government or private corporations such as facebook? >> guest: private corporations. google knows more about out, tastebook knows more about us -- facebook knows more about us because there's no constraint on them. at least we're seeing, we're seeing some, oh, pushback to government agencies. they have to comply with the fourth amendment which says if i have a reasonable expectation of privacy, i can keep my social

network post private unless the government gets a warrant. that's not true with data aggregators. and i see that in very specific cases. the fbi actually went to a judge and said i want a warrant to turn on a suspect's camera on his laptop to take pictures of him. the judge said, no. but private companies put that tracking mechanism on wiretaps all the time. and in pennsylvania a school gave laptops to all its students. they didn't tell the students or the parents that the camera could be turned on from the school. it was only supposed to be turned on if the laptop was stolen to get a picture of the thief. but the i.t. department hat the high school -- at the high school took 30,000 photos of students, took 50,000 screen shots.

and where do high school students have their laptop open? their bedroom, they're coming from the shower, they're in bed and so forth. and the fbi was called into investigate, they said there's no, you know, criminal law against that. so we're all vulnerable to what institutions other than the government can do, facebook, google and so forth. europe there are more protections about it. not so here. although we have some people in office -- senator ed markey, oh, congressman joe barton, senator al franken -- who are concerned about these issues. and the central trade commission is considering something like a do not track law -- the federal trade commission. we already have a do not call list, so why not a do not track list that prevents people from tracking us and companies and marketers and google and so forth without our advance

permission. i think it's a good idea, and i'm mindful of what the great american humorist dave barry once said which is that the do not call list was the greatest government invention second only to the elvis stamp. >> host: but, lori andrews, you tell the story in your book of a law student of yours who tried to disable all the cookies that track him throughout his day, and it took him forever. >> guest: it does take you forever, and that's why i think the default should be opt in rather than opt out. right now cookies are put on your computer, and you have to try to figure out which company put it on which you often can't find out. go to the company and say could you take me off x. and then there's this very perverse thing. some companies that have a do not track approach actually achieve that by means of putting a cookie on your computer to say, lori andrews, she's the one that doesn't want to be tracked.

if you disable your cookies, it actually puts you back into tracking. is right now the situation being opt out is sort of like i come home from a hard day's work, there is 30 strangers in my home. and i individually have to ask each one of them to leave. i think the situation should be opt in. nobody puts cookies on my computer e unless i specifically invite them s. what we're seeing with respect to children in new, a new federal law and ftc regulations is that for children under age 13 you can't condition being in the web site or the social network on giving up your right to privacy. another thing my law student found was that you couldn't go on certain web sites unless you agreed to cookies. so we need to change that. we have changed it for under 13-year-olds, we should change it for adults as well. >> host: professor andrews, if

you had to foresee a supreme court case around some of these issues, what do you foresee? >> guest: well, there are a couple things. justice sotomayor seemed to hint that she would like to take a look at the fact that now third party surveillance, so if someone wells remotely turns on my -- someone else remotely turns on my laptop camera, police can use those pictures. she's thinking we need to reconsider this third party doctrine that if the police get it from somebody else's surveillance, they can use it. i think we may see a case about that. but i think we'll see some cases where people have actually had financial losses based on information collected about them that may, in fact, not have been true. i mean, just because i shop at a bargain web site doesn't mean i'm going to be someone who doesn't pay off her credit card bills. the problem has been that most people don't even realize this

is occurring, and so they haven't been able to come forth to say i was harmed in this way. i lost a mortgage as a result, i lost a job as a result. but i think we'll ultimately see people who are a little more tech-savvy finding out the cause and those cases going to court. >> in your book "i know who you are and i saw what you did," you have a social network constitution. what is that? >> guest: we have a constitution, a bill of rights off the web that has things like a right to privacy and a freedom of expression, freedom of association. i want those rights to go on line as well, and it was a way of trying to build a foundation for judges who are willing to rule in this direction to have a grounds on which to do it. it was also a way to let people know what the slippage is. one thing is that i never anticipated when i started writing book that i would see social networks go getting in

the way of a right to a fair trial. but with it turns out even though you're only supposed to make judgments based on what evidence comes in in the courtroom, jurors are using google to do searches of the crime scene or find out what the witness' myspace page said and making all these judgments based on external information that has no relevance. so the if i found -- so if i found, if i googled a corner where a murder was thought to have occurred, i might think, oh, the witness, of course, was able to see because there's a lot of light on that corner. the, you know, the lawyers might not have the -- even know the juror's done that and might not have a chance to correct it by saying, well, on the fight it was raining -- the night it was raining, the light was knocked out and so forth. you even have jurors posting the

facts of the case on facebook and asking their friends vote up or down about whether we should fry this guy, whether we should criminalize what he did. so i, i think that i'm trying to make judges aware of that very, very basic rights, individual rights -- right to a tear trial, freedom of privacy, freedom of association -- are being denied to people online and to move the conversation along just like it was moved along with the kodak fiend, the portable camera 125 years ago. >> host: one of those in the constitution, one of them is the right to connect. no government shall abridge the right to connect, nor shall a government monitor exchanges over the internet or code them as to sources or content. and is that occurring today? >> guest: well, we're or seeing more and more governmental back doors into web sites, so i

really was astonished how in the arab spring president obama actually had -- stated that we have a right to use social networks, that it's a right like the freedom of association and freedom of press. and he was saying it in response to the fact that when protests began in egypt, the egyptian government just shut down the internet, knocked everybody off twitter and and facebook so they couldn't organize. so president obama at that time was indicating we would never do that. now, more and more we're seeing that that's just not the case that, in fact, the government has been, you know, keeping track in some way, and i think that is inconsistent with our democratic principles. and we need a social discussion at the very least. i work in another area of technology, genetic technology,

and police just didn't start a giant forensic dna databank of everybody in the universe by, you know, following them around and seeing where they spit and doing dna coding. we had a social discussion about whose dna should be collected, and we determined it was people who had committed crimes and were more likely to commit other crimes so that we could solve subsequent crimes. we didn't put everybody in there, but even's going into a database -- everybody's going into a database about a digital database. i think we need the same sort of societal protections that we had in the genetic era. >> host: and we have been talking with lori andrews. she is a professor of law at the kent college of law at the illinois institute of technology, and she's also the author of this book, "i know who you are and i saw what you did." you're watching "the communicators" on c-span.

>> c-span, created by america's cable companies in 979 -- 1979, brought to you as a public service by your television provider. >> secretary of state john kerry talked about the progress afghan women have made over the past ten years. he was introduced by his predecessor, former secretary of state hillary clinton. the event was hosted by georgetown university. it's about 40 minutes. >> i want to once again thank president dejoy ya and all of the university for your active leadership not only on behalf of the intellectual study of and analysis of issues of importance to our world, but your leadership this the civic life not only of washington, but of our country and, indeed, across the globe. this is yet another example of

that, and i welcome the members of the diplomatic corps who are here with us and in particular all of the women of and from afghanistan who have joined us today. i am very honored to be the honorary co-chair of the u.s. after began with women's council along with laura bush. mrs. bush has been the real inspiration and driving force behind the council from the very beginning. and the council represents a commitment, a public/private partnership to try to support the women of afghanistan in the transition that they are undergoing. we can point to a lot of progress, some of it mentioned by president dejoia and in the

excellent video that just was shown, but we're well aware this is a serious turning point for all the seem of afghanistan, but in particular for the hard-fought gains that women and girls have been able to enjoy. and what we can do as americans to try to support these courageous women and men who want to build the afghanistan that they imagine. now, when miranda veer finished her tenure as our first-ever ambassador for global women's issues, she and i talked about what she might do next. the word "rest" never entered her vocabulary. [laughter] we talked more about what we could do to continue promoting the role of women in peace and security, a cause that we both care about deeply. and that's why here at georgetown we have seen the

establishment under milan's leadership of the first-ever institute for women, peace and security in the entire world insofar as we know. once again i'm just following milan wherever she goes and am proud to be the honorary founding chair. the institute is cosponsoring today's events, but the institute is much more than events even though they are important, it's really going to lead the way to establish a scholarship that we can look to following up on the national action plan that was adopted in the first term of the obama administration, pointing out the benefits to be gained by including women in peacemaking and peace keeping, recognizing women's security needs, sometimes unique only to women. bringing the world, particularly defense and intelligence analysts onboard with diplomats and development experts and

academics about what we can do to support the security of women and to engage them in peace building. now, as you saw at the, in the video, there was that wonderful quote by the brigadier general that men and women are like two wings on the same beared. bird. i think i'm going to shamelessly appropriate that. [laughter] but it is true. it is absolutely a vivid image to keep in our minds. you cannot move forward whether you're talking economically, litically, culturally -- politically, culturally, security wise without both wigs flapping. and -- wings flapping. and what we have the opportunity to do through the council, through the georgetown institute is to partner with governments around the world, particularly those that have been involved in the international coalition or in support of a lot of the development and human rights work that has gone on in afghanistan.

in order to keep that hope and promise alive to women and girls in afghanistan, that they will not go back, they will not be forced back into fairholmes, denied -- into their homes, denied education and health care, stripped of their rights to participate in the economy and the political system of their country. and in so doing, we have a great friend and ally in this effort who has been a champion of afghanistan and particularly afghan women's rights for many years. he also happens to hold a job that i know a little something about -- [laughter] he is someone who has been just tireless in pursuit of peace and trying to tackle some of the toughest, most difficult problems on the global agenda. and i'm delighted that he is with us here today. he is no stranger to afghanistan

and has just last month gone back to kabul, negotiating with president karzai over the bilateral security agreement that is absolutely core to protecting the security of afghan women and girls. john kerry's enduring commitment to afghanistan is america's enduring commitment. he understands we cannot walk away from this country or this region when our troops come home, that we cannot turn our backs on the people of afghanistan, especially the women. if their rights and opportunities are undermined, the entire country's stability and prosperity will be undermined as well. so it is my great delight to introduce someone who is known as s, standing for secretary of state, and someone who i know sends a strong message just by being here.

but beyond the words that you will hear of his understanding and commitment, there's a real passion. we have an advocate for the women and girls of afghanistan in secretary john kerry. pleasure. [applause] >> thank you. thank you, hillary, thank you very much. thank you very much, hillary, for a very, very generous introduction. thank you most of of all for the remarkable work that you have done. i think you're over here, hillary. here we go. [laughter] get you over there. you know, that's my job, seat the former first lady, secretary. [laughter] what a pleasure to be here and distinguished members of the diplomatic corps, president

dejoia, thank you for this. unbelievable, one of my favorite venues in the world. madam secretary, slash first lady, former senator, slash everything -- [laughter] i'm really happy to be here. for all the men studying here at georgetown who sat in or sit in classrooms where bill clinton sat so many years ago, my advice to you is this: study hard, go to oxford be, become governor of your state and then maybe you can marry one of the country's remarkable secretaries of state. [laughter] [cheers and applause] i think everybody here knows that nobody has done more to advance the cause of women and the cause of afghan women together with laura bush in our foreign policy directly than

secretary clinton. and she took the helm of the state department at a particularly challenging time, a critical moment in the history of the war, and she has worked tirelessly to remind all of us that this fight is not just waged on the battlefield. it's a fight for the lives of afghanistan's people and their future. and it is a fight above all for universal values and aspirations, and i think we all owe her a tremendous debt of gratitude for the work that she has done. thank you, hillary. appreciate it. [applause] i want to thank georgetown's institute for women, peace and security. i want to thank the us afghan women's council, the george w. bush institute and the alliance in support of the afghan people for cohosting and coming together to bring this remarkable event together here

today. i particularly want to thank all of you. you are a remarkable group of women, absolutely extraordinary, and i'm pleased to meet a couple of you in afghanistan. thank you for coming here. and i know people will really end joy hearing the program -- enjoy hearing the program later. i want to express my gratitude also to former first lady laura bush. as hillary did in her comments in her introduction, she really helped lead the effort to advance opportunities for women in afghanistan. and if you haven't seen it yet today, she has a terrific op-ed in today's washington post. and madam first lady, we thank you very much for your leadership also. [applause] and as hillary did, i want to pay particular tribute and thanks to our nation's first ambassador at large for global women's issues, melanne ve rveer

and her successor, kathy russell, who has just returned from afghanistan. this is very special for me to be here today particularly with these extraordinary women who have lived their lives every single day to make sure that all women can pursue their potential and live free of violence. we all know that creating opportunities for women is not just the right thing to do, it's also a strategic necessity. societies where women are safe, where women are empowered to exercise their rights and to move their communities forward, these societies are more prosperous and more stable. not occasionally, but always. and nowhere is the pursuit of this vision more important and in ways more compelling and

immediate and possible than in afghanistan. if i had to walk blind into a district in afghanistan and i could only ask one question to determine how secure it was and how much progress it was making, i would ask what proportion of the girls here are able to go to school. there's no question in my mind that investing in afghan women the surest way to guarantee that afghanistan will sustain the gains of the last decade and never again become a safe haven for international terror us. on my many -- terrorists. on my many trips to afghanistan as a senator and as secretary of state, i have met with an array of afghan government officials. i've met with business people, development experts, diplomats, i've met with our brave troops as well as our brave shared

responsibility participation by the international community, the international troops over there, our counterparts, all of whom have sacrificed for the promise of a safe and secure and a sovereign afghanistan. but i actually come back time and again to my very first trip to kabul as secretary of state when i met a remarkable woman who is changing afghanistan. her name is roia. roia is chief executive of a software development firm called citadel, and the local authorities did absolutely everything they could in order to stop her dead in her tracks. they even pressured her family to close her company. but she, like a lot of the women sitting here, like so many women across afghanistan, absolutely refused to be intimidated. and the first time that she

competed for an afghan government project, guess what? she went up against six businesses led by men, and she won. and it's a good thing she won, because roia has invested almost all of her profits to provide internet access to 35,000 girls in herat. and believe me, she's just getting started. today she has plans to help five times as many girls across afghanistan. now, i'm sure you'll hear this in the discussion in a little while. it is hard enough to start your own business anywhere else in the world, but to start it in afghanistan, to balance the books, build a revenue stream, fight against incredible outrage in the local community is sheer guts and courage and determination. she never backed down. instead, she's using her talents and her money in order to connect afghans of all ages, men

and women, boys and girls, to a global community and a global economy where all of us are connected to each other. that's the world we live in today, and that's the world that women in afghanistan want to share into. as roya said to me, she doesn't want to be the only woman who's an entrepreneur in afghanistan. she wants all women to have that opportunity. and she believes nothing should stop any of them. now, i'm serious when i tell you that i think of roya and the women like her that i've met in afghanistan every time i hear the amazing numbers that illustrate how far this country has come since 2001 and that underscore what secretary clinton was saying a few minutes ago about how critical our choices are with respect to the future. in 2001, back then there were only 900,000 afghan children in school. and all of them were boys.

today nearly eight million students are in school, and more than a third of them are girls. think about what that means for the future. in 2001 maternal mortality was 1600 per 100,000 births. today it's down by 80%. in 2001 life expectancy for the average afghan was 42 years. today it's 62 years and rising. in 2001 9% of afghans had access to basic health care. today 60% of afghans live within an hour of basic health services. in 2001 there was only one television station, and it was owned by the government. today there are 75 stations, and only two with -- and all of those but two are privately

owned. and in 2001 there were virtually no cell phones in the country. today there are 18 million covering about 90% of residential areas. .. watching afghan women build. and as secretary clinton and laura bush and ambassadors verveer and russell powerfully remind us, when afghan women

live longer and go to school in greater numbers, all afghan families and their communities will grow stronger. when afghan women run their own businesses, all afghans profit from a more diverse, dynamic, and inclusive economy. and when afghan women hold public office at the local and national levels, all afghans gain a stronger voice in their communities. that is the vision behind the united states national action plan on women, peace and security, which president obama directed to be implemented two years ago and which hillary spoke about just a few minutes ago. and that's why we are committed to bringing the perspectives of women and their full participation to bear on these opportunities and challenges in afghanistan going forward. now what has moved me, and i mean moved me, in my meetings with an impressive group of

afghan women entrepreneurs is that when afghan women move forward, believe me, they never want to go back. not to the days when the taliban ruled afghanistan. not to the days before the taliban when the country was torn apart by violence. and that is why it is so important that we keep investing in and defending the progress that empowers afghan women, as well as men, to be able to have their voices heard and to buy into their future and shape their future. what has been achieved is nothing less than remarkable, and it would have been more than a tragedy if the world ever allowed this progress to be threatened or, worse yet, to be abandoned. so the question now is, where do we go from here? because as we think about the future, we are mindful of the challenges that afghan women continue to face.

this is a critical moment. many of the women that i've met share very legitimate concerns that the gains of the past decade could be lost. all that i talked about could be wiped out. and the truth is their anxiety that i hear when i visit afghanistan, or you'll hear today, it's palpable. despite the significant achievements of afghan women and girls, many challenges still remain. and we remember too well the difficulties, the difficult history that led to the decades of war in afghanistan. we know the costs of walking away. believe me, afghan women know the costs because they have always paid the steepest price. so i say to you today, as afghanistan sees women standing up in afghanistan to take

control of their country's future, not only for themselves, but for all afghans, we have to be determined that they will not stand alone. america will stand up with them as they shape a strong and united afghanistan that secures the rightful place in the community of nations. and that is why president obama and president karzai signed a strategic partnership agreement last year that lays out our mutual commitments. and that's why america's relationship with afghans is changing. it's not ending. there's a lot to do, so much to do, and obviously the road ahead is not easy. the violence that has plagued afghanistan for decades has left very deep wounds, and it is going to take time to heal. we also know that security is

going to be a real challenge. we know that afghans have to strengthen the rule of law. they have to improve access to justice. we also know that discrimination and violence against women continue to be major problems. but i know every one of these women and the women in afghanistan today will remain determined, and we have an obligation to remain determined and stand by them. we intend to make clear that securing the rights of afghan women and girls is not just a challenge for this moment. it's a generational challenge. in fact, we've already made a significant down payment, but make no mistake, finishing this job is going to take courage, and not just the courage of women in afghanistan. as a proud father of two daughters, i have many times been reinforced in the fact that this job will require the courage of men, too.

in afghanistan, it will take the courage of every man who defends his daughter's right to an equal education. it will take the courage of every brother who challenges a law that keeps his sister from owning property or opening a business, and every husband who not only promises that the cycle of domestic violence can stop with him, but who actually proves it. we have spent a great blood and treasure in afghanistan, and that makes even greater our obligation to get this right. yes, there are challenges ahead. for sure, the transition is going to be difficult. but without question, there's a world of possibilities staring us in the face. in fact, the transition that we are talking about and now working on is really about three transitions, a political transition, a security transition, and an economic transition. and no surprise, afghan women

are playing an integral role in all of them. just look at the political transition. we all know that the single most important milestone over the next year is the peaceful transfer of power from president karzai to a democratically elected successor. the elections have to be on time. they have to be accountable and transparent and free and fair and accessible. they have to be inclusive and result in an outcome that is perceived as legitimate by all segments of afghan society above all, but also by the international community. above all, though elections obviously always entail competition and debate, they've got to be a unifying moment for the country, not a divisive one. as we speak, as we are here, afghan women are leading the charge to ensure that the elections next year are credible, inclusive, and transparent.

gulalay achekzai is one of those women. gulalay is a teacher by profession, but she's always had this passion for public service. she used to work as a human rights commissioner in kandahar. today, she's serving on the independent election commission. she told president karzai she has only one character flaw, that she fears no one. now we are deeply encouraged by the gulalays and others who are taking part in this, by the hundreds of women from all over the country, who are running for positions on provincial councils. and we are very pleased to lend our support, in partnership with the united nations, to train female volunteers as they facilitate secure access for women at the polls. there is no question that lasting security and prosperity in a unified afghanistan will take root only when women have as loud a voice as men, not just on election day, but every day.

the success of the political transition is essential. it's the prerequisite to the future stability of afghanistan. but make no mistake, it's not enough, it's not sufficient, it won't do the job alone. that's why the united states firmly supports and will continue to support an afghan-led peace and reconciliation effort as the surest way to end the violence and bring lasting stability to afghanistan and the region. but peace is only possible if it respects the historic achievements that afghanistan has made over the past decade, all those things i listed and talked about, including above all the protection of the rights of all afghans, both men and women. and as part of the outcome of any process, the taliban and other armed opposition groups have to end the violence, break ties with al-qaida, accept

afghanistan's constitution, including its provisions on women's rights. those are the standards which will lead us in this effort. there can be no compromise on these points. and there can be no peace without respecting the rights of all afghans, and afghan women have to have a seat at the table. afghan women are also at the forefront of the second part of the transition, the security transition. this is one of the most stunning things. you saw it in the video. these folks in uniform, unprecedented. they're joining the army and the police, and they're serving as judges, prosecutors in some of the most conservative parts of the country. it's an extraordinary transformation. my team recently met with a female police officer from kabul. for those of you who have been to afghanistan, you'll know there aren't too many female

police officers, and even fewer of them are willing to step forward and tell their story. but on her way home from work one evening, this particular police officer heard another woman screaming inside a house. and when she heard the cries, she didn't run away. she didn't call someone else to come and do the job. she went right up to the house, knocked down the door in order to help. police officer went inside and she saw a woman inside badly beaten on the ground and her husband was standing over her. without any hesitation, she was not intimidated, not an ounce of fear, she pushed the husband aside and took the victim to her own house in order to record her statement and make a report. believe me, believe me, that's courage. and it's an example that all afghans can be proud of and follow.

they can be proud that their security and law enforcement forces are growing stronger by the day, more capable by the day. and of course, they can be proud that this past summer, the afghan national security forces took over the lead responsibility in providing security all across the country. now, as you know, we have made a commitment along with our nato partners to continue to advise, train, and support the afghan forces beyond 2014, should afghans approve in the next, within the next two weeks the bilateral security agreement. and make no mistake, bringing women into the force and supporting their safe and meaningful participation is going to be a key part of this transition. i'm pleased to report to you now that we are closer than ever to completing this task of defining

our new partnership with afghanistan, going well into the future. the bilateral security agreement, when it is completed, will help both countries to fulfill the longstanding commitment that we made to a security partnership after 2014. but i want to underscore again that nothing, neither this agreement when completed, nor the assistance that we provide, will replace the role that the afghan people themselves will play determining the future of their country. afghan women are also taking enormous risk to support afghanistan's third transition. that's the economic transition. and women like hassina sayed are leading the charge. i met hassina in march. she started a trucking company,

i think, about 10 years ago. she started it with $500. now, she has 500 trucks. of her 650 employees, 300 are women who not so long ago would absolutely never have had the opportunity they have today. she told me that she always knew she wanted to be a businesswoman when she grew up. and i asked why, and she said simply, because then i'll get to be my own boss. now, obviously, that's not just an afghan trait. that's a universal aspiration. but afghan women like hassina are forming connections not just within afghanistan, but all across the region. actually, her trucking company is doing a great deal of work in the stans and outside of afghanistan in order to bring supplies and things, food and so forth, into the country. and what i found is that all of the afghans understand they may be landlocked, but they're not trapped, and they refuse to be trapped.

afghanistan is linked everywhere by roads, railways, products, markets. and the reality is that afghanistan's fortunes are tied to the whole region, just as the future of the region is tied to the stability of afghanistan. we call this the new silk road vision, which secretary clinton launched in july of 2011. it's a vision we believe in, and it's a vision we're going to continue to work hard to implement. hassina knows that the benefits of investing in women and girls are not limited to one village, one province, or one country alone. they ripple out across the borders. you all remember that great quote of robert kennedy's about rippling and creating a huge current that sweeps down the mightiest walls of oppression. that's what's happening. and that's why investing in the training and mentoring of afghan women entrepreneurs is so important.

that's why we launched the regional economic women's initiative in bishkek and in dhaka in order to link female entrepreneurs to markets in south and central asia. and that strengthens those women to have those connections to those other parts of the region. that's why we're investing in the education of afghan girls, so they can break the cycle of poverty and become community leaders and engaged citizens in ways that inspire and actually strengthen their neighbors' willingness to join them. that is the future that, even here in gaston hall today, we are all building together. and that's the story that i want to leave you with today. as i was flying back from kabul in march, my staff handed me a letter from a young afghan girl who had earned a scholarship from the state department to study at the american university of afghanistan.

and this young girl has exactly the same courage as women like roya, hassina, gulalaya, who are marching forward to define this new future for afghanistan. she has the same vision as leaders like hillary rodham clinton and laura bush, who know that no country can succeed if it leaves half of its people behind. the phrase that hillary and i both loved as we heard it about the bird with two wings can't fly with one wing. one line in that girl's letter stood out to me. she wrote about the importance of education and how her goal is not just to help herself, but to lift her community, her society, and her country, just like roya, gulalay, and hassina are doing today. you know what she wrote, very simply? she said, i want to be one of them. that's the power of example.

that's the ripple fanning out to create the current. think about that for a minute. she feels ownership over the future that she is creating in afghanistan, and that's not something that her sisters or her mother could say even a decade ago. but girls all over afghanistan, believe me, i promise you, they are saying it today and they are living that dream thanks to the courage and the leadership of women themselves in afghanistan. our responsibility is clear. we need to make sure that they succeed. because this is one of those benchmark moments not just for them, but for all of us in what we care about, what we fight for, and who we are. as we move forward, just keep thinking about that young girl who wrote that letter and the inspiration that she draws from women like roya, gulalay, and hassina. she just wants to be one of them. and making that happen is going

to take every single one of us. thank you very much. [applause] thank you. thank you very much. now we get to the really exciting part of the program. i want to invite secretary clinton, mrs. bush, anita haidary, and her extraordinary colleagues to all come up on stage so we have an opportunity to listen to anita for a moment, and then i think we're going to go out and they're going to set up the chairs and the program will continue. can i invite all of you up here, please? [applause]

>> [inaudible conversations] >> thank you, secretary kerry. secretary clinton, mrs. bush, and ambassador. you have no idea how much your work has impacted afghanistan. it's a special honor for me to be on this stage with my afghan

role models, the afghan women leaders today. secretary kerry told you about the women he met in afghanistan that showed in the change is possible in my country. i see myself as one of those young women. my story is like mayors. like many afghan children, i saw the world through the eyes of a refugee. i had dreams of my homeland, but my dreams only became a reality in 2002 when my family could finally return to afghanistan. returning home was not easy. we had to make many adjustments. life was hard, but we finally were home. my family took advantage of the opportunities and sent me and my four sisters, and my brother, the school. well, i did well enough that i

was able to become an exchange student in california. the move was not easy. i was alone. the cultural difference. but i learn new things. i had always believed that young people could make a difference. but i didn't know how. back home, people if they believed that you had to do something really big, or nothing. i learned from my fellow american students that you could be very small things in the community, like cleaning up youe neighborhood. it doesn't look big, but through small actions, it makes a big difference. then i went back on the kabul. i took those lessons and i talked to my fellow students and started mentoring other students. we thought about things that we needed to change. for example, we were tired of being harassed every time we tried to live a normal life. by going to school or going

shopping. my friends and i started a campaign. and we decided to go out, young men and women. and sometimes people harassed us. we organize demonstrations to make our voices heard. no one ever talked about these issues. we didn't even have a definition for harassment. but after our march people started, they were talking about it. it was an example of a small, collective action making a big impact. why am i telling you this story? well, i'm telling you this because i want you to know that we are not stuck in the past. our country is made up of 60% men, and women. people who are hungry for change. our women are not simply victims. see ourselves as agents of change.

my story is just one story. throughout afghanistan there are many of us, through small actions, sacrifices, working hard to transform our society and future. but we need your help, all of you. we have an expression in afghanistan that you cannot -- [inaudible] we raise our hands, join us, transform our future. thank you. [applause] >> thank you very much. >> ladies and gentlemen, please remain seated. the program will resume shortly with a conversation with secretary hillary clinton, mrs. laura bush, and ambassador

maligned -- malan. >> today, discussion with health care professionals on health care costs and price caps on some plans currently being offered by employers. they will speak at an event hosted by the alliance for health reform and you can see it live 12:15 p.m. eastern here on c-span2. also today remarks from ms. magazine founder gloria steinem. is one of 16 people president obama honored this year with the presidential medal of freedom to us nation's highest civilian honor. watch that event from the national press club life 1 p.m. eastern on c-span3. finally, the senate homeland security committee examines the impact of digital currencies that allow people to exchange goods and services without using real money. that hearing begins live free eastern also on c-span3.

>> mrs. johnson as first lady love to show off the texas home. but guess what often gather here in the been in various heads of state came to visit. we do have a few things of connection. one of the things you want to highlight was a native american heritage here in the hill country and we do have a small collection of arrowheads or she had an eye for copper, and collected various items through the years and ideas from various friends. mrs. johnson gave a tour of the house in 1968 that was filmed where she featured the tiny you see pictured here purchase or mexico. very colorful. she spent a lot of time here at the ranch and it was important because it provided such a rest from all the turmoil, particularly letter and the residency when the johnsons become home to recharge their batteries and make the connection back to the land and this place they valued so much.

>> first lady, lady bird johnson tonight on c-span and c-span3. also on c-span radio in c-span.org. >> if you're a middle or high school student, c-span studentcam video competition wants to know what's the most important issue congress should address next year? make it 5278 and include c-span programming for your chance to win the grand prize of $5000 with $100,000 in total prizes. the deadline is january 20. get more info at studentcam.org. >> fbi director james comey recently told a senate panel that cyber attacks were likely to eclipse terrorism as a threat over the next decade. he appeared with acting homeland security secretary rand beers and head up the national counterterrorism center. they testified before the senate homeland security committee. this runs about two hours.

>> this hearing will come to order. good morning, everyone. welcome to our witnesses. dr. coburn and i welcome all of you, and we will be joined by some of our colleagues here as the morning progresses or we're happy you are all here bright and. today's hearing will consider threats to the u.s. homeland from terrorists, cyber attackers, homegrown extremists and lone wolf offenders. the objective of the hearing is for this committee to get a better understanding of how these threats have evolved over the past year and if our national security agencies are keeping up with these ever-changing threats. i would add another focus for the sins is to find out what we need to be doing on the legislative side to better and able you to keep up with these ever-changing threats. as we know, 12 years ago, ma our

country sense of security was upended when al qaeda launched the most significant attack on u.s. soil since pearl harbor. in the years since that tragic day, we have made significant progress in combating the terrorist threat to the homeland. and i only have a decent argument i want to express our thanks from the american people for the very, very good work that has been done, continues to be done to try to make sure that we stay safe in a very dangerous world. our aviation system is more secure. our borders are stronger. our government agencies share will more terrorist intelligence than ever before. our first responders are better prepared to deal with disasters and terrorist attacks. americans are safer because of these efforts. while we have made great strides, our system for preventing terrorist attacks is not perfect. as dr. coburn knows, one of my guiding principles is if it's not perfect make it better. it's not a time to rest on

idols. it's a time to thank those that are working hard to make us safe, keep us safe and continue to work hard and smarter. in this spirit, this committee will continue its work to improve america's defenses against terrorism and other threats. part of this process means understanding that the threat is also evolving. if we are to make america safer from these threats, and secure the homeland, we must do a better job of anticipating these evolving threats. we do a good job at fighting the last war, but to secure the homeland we must be better at anticipating the next war. we know that the threat from al qaeda has changed over the past decade. we are now dealing with a number of splinter groups, including al qaeda in the arabian peninsula which was responsible for the christmas day attack in 2009 and which continues its efforts to attack us to this day. and we know that american citizens, as well as canadian and european nationals, have taken up arms in syria, yemen, and somalia. the threat that these individuals could return home to carry out attacks is real, and

troubling. even as our borders and ports of entry have become more secure, there are still those within our borders who have become radicalized by online al-qaeda propaganda and seek to carry out their own attacks against the u.s. and there are other threats to our domestic security, unrelated to al-qaeda, which we must be prepared to address. as the september attack on the washington navy yard and the shooting at the los angeles airport two weeks ago demonstrate, there are a variety of threats to federal personnel and federal facilities that we must be prepared to defend against. however, nowhere is the need to prepare for the next attack more pressing than in the cybersecurity realm. cyber threats may equal or surpass the threat of terrorism in the foreseeable future. with a few key strokes, hackers

can shut down our electric grid, release dangerous chemicals into the air we breathe, or disrupt our financial markets. now more than ever, we must come together to pass cybersecurity legislation that strengthens our defenses against these cyber threats. the threat is too great, the potential consequences too severe, to do nothing. today's hearing will explore these threats, as well as others. we will hear testimony from the leaders of the department of homeland security, the national counter terrorism center and the federal bureau of investigation about the greatest dangers to the homeland and the steps our -- their colloids are taking to further secure our country. the findings from today's hearing will help continue our process of recalibrating our homeland defenses to address our current threats, as was prepared -- prepare for to mars threat. it will also help us ensure that we have a government in place that can connect the dots before

terror comes to our shores. i look forward to hearing from each of our witnesses and the committees, members of our committee do as well as we seek to defeat those threats and keep our countrymen and women safe from those who wish to do us harm. now we turn to dr. coburn for any remarks he wishes to make. >> thank you. >> good morning, senator. >> let me welcome you to the committee. i have expressed this to senator carper. i think we are best when we have open hearings but we at this committee also need a clustering because the members will not be able to be made aware of the things that need to be made aware of without a clustering. so i would look forward to that at some point in the future. secretary beers, i want to thank you for the great work you are doing filling in at homeland

security, and the cooperative nature you have done. you've been great to work with and i want to say i appreciate that. and thank you for it. director comey, it's a privilege to have you serving in your position today. i support your position, and having worked with you both in intelligence community and here, i appreciate what you're doing. and matt, you've been tremendous. and people will never know all the work that nctc does because they can't, but it's tremendous and i applaud you for being here your other than i will reserve most of my comments for question and answer after we've heard the comments from our panelists. i do appreciate your service. this is an important issue and it's important that we are having a discussion in public about what the real threats are. there's a discussion on how we address those. there's a difference of opinion and how we do it. the one final note i would make is, we need to have some reforms

so this committee has the authority and responsibility to do those things, like this month reform in some the other reforms in cyber but it will be harder move on but -- that's one of the areas that we have to make sure we've got right to forget more. so without i would yell back and look forward to our witnesses testimony. >> thank you. let me take just a moment to introduce our panel of distinguished witness the our first witness is rand beers. i was joking in the interim, i knew him when he was six for the mike and had shoulder length blonde hair but i didn't linda vinton. i do not that he ever had hair that long. i would just say just back up what dr. coburn said. you've taken on a tough job. when you had your day job at homeland security and then you ask to be deputy secretary, now you're asked to be the acting -- acting deputy secretary and now acting secretary. that's all for any one man or

woman. thank you for doing it. doing it in good spirit. rand has been serving as acting secretary of homeland security since early september when janet napolitano left us to head up the department at the university of california system on the west coast. rand most recent serve as the acting deputy secretary before held the position of undersecretary of -- prior to becoming department of homeland security secretary beers serve a national security staff under not one, not two, not three but for president. he began his professional career as a marine corps officer in vietnam. if we go back five days it was her birthday in the morning or so belated happy birthday and thank you for your service in southeast asia. welcome home. but thank you for joining us today. next witness, james comey, director of the federal bureau of investigation. he has a tough act to follow. thank you for your willingness

to do this, and we're excited about your leadership and the way you hit the ground running. he is the seventh director of the fbi since september i believe. he brings a wealth of law-enforcement experience to the fbi having served as the u.s. attorney for the southern district of new york, and as deputy attorney general at the department of justice. after leaving the department of justice in 2005, he served as the general counsel of lockheed martin and then held the same position at investment management firm of bridgewater associates. thank you for your presence today, your testimony. thank you very much for your use of service to our country. final witness is a matt olsen, director of the national counterterrorism center. good morning. he has served as the director of the national counterterrorism center for just over two years and his position he oversees the analysis and integration of all terrorism intelligence in the united states government, and

reporting directly to the director of national intelligence. additionally, he oversees the strategic operational planning for characters and activities that required him to report directly to the president. prior to joining the national counterterrorism center, mr. olson was the general counsel for the national security agency, and the deputy assistant attorney general for the national security division. again, thank you for joining us today. we welcome your testimony. going to turn over to you and mr. secretary, if you'd like to lead us off and after you're finished your testimonies, we'll get into a good conversation. please proceed. thank you all again for joining us. >> thank you, chairman carper and ranking member coburn, and the members of the committee for the opportunity to be here to testify. i would also like to thank my co-panelists, directors come and also for the partnership and strong collaboration as we together meet the shared responsibility keep the american people safe. before i begin my testimony, i'd

like to urge you all and the senate to confirm jeh johnson as my replacement and confirm nominee. i've known him for a long time and i know he cares deeply about our mission. and i think he is considerable skill and intellect and, dedication to deal with these evolving threats. senator coburn, i appreciate your remarks to him yesterday. in short i think you make an excellent secretary. i would also like to take a moment, as you did, senator carper, to recognize transportation sector the officer fernandez who was killed at the los angeles airport on the first of november he was an exceptional officer and his loss will be felt within tsa and the department. i had the honor and summer experience of going to his memorial service yesterday. it was a very moving event.

spent let me interrupt. is there another memorial service may be next monday? >> we are having won here at tsa, yes, that is correct. >> 1:00 on monday? >> i will get the time precisely to you but we will have another one here. that senseless act as you said reminds us every day that dangers to the men and women to work on the front lines of our department and other parts of the u.s. government have very real sacrifices that they often have to make on our behalf. we continue to work closely with the bureau and the state and local law enforcement to fully investigate this crime and ensure that justice is done as the attorney general said yesterday. dhs worked very closely with all of our partners across the country to build critical capabilities at every level, whether sharing information, protecting critical infrastructure or protecting our cyberspace but we work with the

private sector on improving preparedness and resilience and addressing the evolving threats such as i just mentioned it because of his work our nation i believe a strong and better equipped to handle these threats and where more nimble and our ability to respond and recover but nevertheless we continue to face a dynamic threat environment that includes threats from abroad as well as those that originate within our borders. at dhs our chief operating principle has been to work with partners to detect and deter these threats as early as possible to build the capability to respond if and when required, and enhance our ability to recover after the fact. we sought to get information, tools and resources out of washington, d.c. and into the partners that we work with on the front line. at the federal level with intelligence and law enforcement partners like the bureau and nctc we've made strides i believe in information sharing and joint analysis through state and major urban areas fusion centers with improved sharing of both classified and unclassified information that build graphs

risked a dose of the state of a global stick with the fbi we have now standardized that we train front-line law enforcement to recognize behaviors and indicators that have historically been associated with terrorism and report suspicious activities as part of the national suspicious activities reporting initiative. we have greatly expanded our training and our outrage from countering violent extremism and active shooter threats providing extensive tools, workshops and analysis on potential indicators of terrorism and providing partners with resources and training to effectively respond to active shooter threats. we've also strengthen our ability to address improvise explosive devices, training and awareness and grants and information sharing. these investments directly contributed to the comprehensive and well executed response of the boston marathon attack and prevented more lives from being lost on that tragic day. we've also expanded our "see something, say something" campaign to more than 250 cities

and states and transportation systems, universities and private sector entities nationwide to encourage the public to play an active role in reporting suspicious of dignity. with respect to our aviation center, sector, we build upon the successes of our risk-based approach which includes pre-screening of passengers, deployment of new technologies, training of airport security and law enforcement personnel to better detect those behaviors potentially associated with terrorism, and strengthening our air cargo security. today we are much better able to protect the aviation sector because we that those who are traveling, we seek to travel or immigrate to united states against a broad array of law enforcement and intelligence information. we are working with our components to identify ways to further enhance these operations to enhance them to harness the power of data management while providing better safeguards and access control but we also continue to leverage information

in technology to expedite trusted travelers to a successful programs such as global entry and tsa precheck. to date, more than 16 million travelers have already experienced precheck. of course as you said, one of our major threats, one of our greatest threats that we continue to face is cyber networks, a threat to our cyber networks and infrastructure. our nation confronts a dangerous combination of known and unknown cyber vulnerabilities and adversaries with strong and rapidly expanding capabilities. our focus at dhs remains securing unclassified federal system government networks, working with critical infrastructure, owners and operators, combating cyber crime, noting and national capacity to promote responsible cyber behavior, and cultivating the next generation of front-line cybersecurity professionals. all the while protecting the privacy, civil rights and civil liberties. to this end we deploy technology to protect and block cyber intrusions and we're developing

continuous diagnostic capabilities while providing guidance to federal agencies on how to protect themselves. we've also worked closely with infrastructure, owners and operators to strengthen of facilities to an on site risk assessment, mitigation and incident response. and by sharing risk and threat information through us-cert and other means. since 2009, we've also prevented 10 billion potential losses to our cybercrime investigations with domestic and international partners, and arrested more than 5000 individuals who participated in cyber crime activities. we've partnered with the departments of justice and defense to ensure the whole of government approach when responding to cyber incidents and threats. while these accomplishments are significant and presiden presidt obama's further strengthen them through executive action, we still need congress to pass a sweep of comprehensive cybersecurity legislation to be best able to meet this growing threat.

thank you very much for this opportunity. >> thank you for that testimony. before i turn it over to director comey, during the q&a will go back to cybersecurity and get an update as to where the administration -- where are we with respect to implementing the president's executive order, the framework, and then what you need from us and why you need it. so just be ready for that. it would be my first question. director comey. >> thank you, chairman carper, ranking member coburn, and members of the committee for inviting here today. most of all for your support of the men and women of the fbi. as i think about threats to the homeland, i worry most about terrorism and cyber attacks. first terrorism. i think about our terrorism threat today as a metastasizing threat in two different ways. first, i worry most at home about the individuals we call

homegrown violent extremists. they are people for inspired by al qaeda but he directed themselves and equip themselves to engage in their own version of jihad on behalf of terrorist interests. they are certainly encouraged by al qaeda around the world. we've seen al qaeda again already embracing the tragedy at the boston marathon, and they were very much that they are inspired also by high profile attacks around the world on so called soft targets. the second aspect in which i worry about the homeland terrorism threat is in al qaeda itself. also we as a nation have made great progress against core al qaeda in pakistan, it hides the threat posed has become hydra headed. headed. by that i'm in al qaeda affiliates have blossomed and flourished in places aroun aroue world especially in the middle east and north africa. and especially there, in territories that are ungoverned or poorly governed. al qaeda and its affiliates as

you mentioned a special al qaeda in the arabian peninsula post the top terrorist threat to this nation. they are constantly working to develop operatives and techniques to get past our defenses and wreak havoc in the homeland. to combat these threats the fbi relies upon our more than 100 joint terrorism task force is around the country which bring together stay local and federal enforcers to assess the threat and to disrupt the threat before it becomes a reality. we also work closely through our 60 legal attaché offices around the world with the intelligence community and foreign partners to try to press out beyond our borders to identify threats and disrupted them. with respect to cyber, whether by foreign governments or criminals or activists or terrace, attacks on our computers and the systems that connect them have become one of the most serious threats to our nation. as you said, mr. chairman, bob mueller my predecessor testified in also told me privately that he believes that this threat

would during my tenure term come to eclipse even the threat from foreign terrorist our homeland. is based on my two months on the job i believe that he is accurate. the reason is simple. we have connected, all of us all of our lives personal, professional and national to the internet. that's what the bad guys will go because that's where our lives are. and our money, our secrets, and our intellectual property. they can go there at the speed of light, a trip around the world takes milliseconds on internet. there are no safe neighborhood. all of us are next-door neighbors on the internet, in the blink of an eye. in response, the fbi has been working very hard under my predecessor, and continues to build our capacity to identify and respond to cyber threats, focusing on institutions, both our work is done in the homeland and overseas here at home a national cyber investigator joint task force is a grouping

of 19 agencies, intelligence, military and law enforcement that have come together to try and assess the threat, the conflict to work and work smart and quick way. the critical partner in that is seated to my right, the department of homeland security with whom we are working better than ever, and the nsa. we have different responsibilities in different lanes in the road but is essentially we worked together. the good news for the american people is we are doing that incredibly well. our national level coordination is important, the local of is also important to us and so we have stood up cyber task forces in each of our field offices to focus on cyber intrusions. and just as the jttf do, is to bring together federal, state and local enforcers to focus on this threat and to blunt it. overseas we're working through 60 simply go attaches to do the same with our foreign partners. we have fbi agents now embedded with police departments around the world, including in romania,

estonia, ukraine and the netherlands to identify emerging threats because of these threats know no boundaries and move at the speed of light, i tried to identify the key bad actors. but i should add, as hard as we are working to work better together, it's essential the private sector work effectively with a government. the private sector is in almost every circumstance the victims of cybercrime and cyber intrusions, and we need your help to stop them. let me finish b my just sing a couple of words about how i think you and your colleagues in congress can help us combat these threats to carry out our mission. when i became director, i did not talk about the challenge chi would say that i knew it would be a hard job. i discovered that the threat, the challenge i faced most near field is the budget challenge impose on the fbi by sequestrasequestra sequestration. i'm starting a situation where i need to reduce almost 10% of our budget this year. we are eliminating 3500 decisions and face the prospect

of furlough. we have as you know, mr. chairman, an enormous portfolio of responsibly for the american people, and the challenge of sequestration is, it makes it enormously difficult for us to accomplish that mission. the fbi will always soldier on. we have always tried to be more and more with less. i worry very much we are approaching a situation where we will be doing less with less. with that i think a very much for inviting me here today, and i look forward to discussing these important issues with you. >> thank you. uses the prospect of eliminating 3500 positions in this fiscal year? >> yes. we've already done that. through attrition we are just -- we are not hiring and bob mueller's plan which i greeted as we will eliminate 3500 to get our numbers down. >> additional? on top of which you've already done? >> he marked 3500 decisions for elimination and i'm continuing that. he took out almost $600 million last year and on taking over $700 million this year, unless the sequestration have on us

goes away. >> one last quick question, once a 3500 positions go unfilled or vacated, how many positions does that leave at the fbi? >> we will be down to where we were in 2009. we are down to about 36,000 people, down around 31,000. >> mr. olsen, thanks. >> they do very much, chairman, ranking member coburn, members. thank you for inviting me here today. i want to thank you for your consistent support of the men and women at the national counterterrorism center come and i would invite you to come out do nctc ncr operations firsthand. i'm particularly pleased to be here with james comey and rand beers. where close partners in our common fight against terrorism but it's been just over a year since i last testified before this committee, and at the time i pointed to al qaeda core as director comey referenced, really not as a shadow of its former self. that assessment remains true today. at the same time, al qaeda and

the senior leaders of al qaeda in pakistan are a leader, remain the leader of an ideological movement. and that includes affiliated groups and followers worldwide, particularly in the middle east and north africa. this results in a wide ranging threat of a diverse and dedicated array of factors. recent attack at the westgate mall in nairobi, which was linked t to al-shabaab in somal, illustrates the type of threat we're facing about the world. committed extremists, the availability of weapons and mobile targets. along with january attack at the gas facility in algeria as well as last fall's attack in benghazi, all of these attacks survey sobering reminder of the persistent threat of terrorism that we face in these regions of the world. today, al qaeda score leadership in afghanistan-pakistan border region is still really trying to navigate its response to the

ongoing events in the muslim world and working to promote a global jihadists movement. additionally unrest in the middle east and north africa most notably in syria is creating opportunity for veteran jihadists to recruit and train what may be the next generation of militants. some of them are less dogmatic in their embrace of al qaeda's ideology but still support an anti-western agenda. these developments are really blurring the lines between terrorists, insurgents and criminal groups operating in these regions. here in the united states, here in the u.s. the attack on the boston marathon highlighted the danger of violent extremism at home where terrorists who may have no formal our direct ties to al qaeda but still adhere to the ideology can use simple tactics to wreak havoc on innocent victims. as the president observed in his speech at the national defense university, today a person can consume hateful ideology, commit themselves to violent agenda and learn how to kill without

leaving their home. so our mission is to combat these threats, combat both at home and abroad. we examine threat information, develop leads, work close with domestic and international partners and develop strategic plans to unify our efforts. as part of his responsibilities we are coordinating and integrating intelligence community support for example, to the winter olympics in sochi. i was just in sochi less we can have the opportunity to meet with russian intelligence and security officials to discuss the threat picture we face and the secretive preparations for the games. closer to home, the dedicated workforce that nctc works in concert with our partners particularly fbi and dhs to protect the homeland and we're adapting as the threat evolves. i would like to take a quick moment to share with you some of the measures we been issued over the past year. first, in april along with the dhs and fbi, nctc established a new organization called the joint counterterrorism assessment team, this is the

organization to the interagency threat assessment coordination group which is committed helped to establish a which is no longer sustainable under current budget conditions. what jcat does it brings together state and local first responders from around the country who come to nctc to work side-by-side with federal intelligence analysts to research and produce and get counterterrorism intelligence that is really tailored to state and local and tribal communities. they do this in an unclassified format as much as possible. outside of washington, we continue to build our domestic representative program. we have representatives in a number of cities now and we just added boston, atlanta but these individuals are intelligence analyst, senior intelligence analyst who worked with the task force is in the fusion centers to bring the national intelligence picture to the local level. as the april attack in boston demonstrated, there are times we will have little or no warning

when they mobilized to violent action. that's why we work close with a federal, state and local officials as those community partners to raise local awareness about the threat of terrorism as part of our efforts. gets through this whole of government approach that we are collaborate with community leaders to counter radicalization, recognizing really that its community stakeholders are best positioned to prevent the exportation of our youth. on the pragmatic side, we recognize that we cannot prevent every attack so we work closely again with dhs and fbi to prepare communities should they need to respond. for several years we've been involved in collaborating with dhs -- to conduct awareness workshops throughout the united states and help cities assess the readiness to respond to terrorist attack. one of our first workshops was in boston back in 2011 and we think that helped contribute to the effective response we saw in boston after the marathon

attack. finally, it's better to detect and disrupt plots, we continue to refine and improve our counterterrorism data layer and are analysts ability to access to the information that they need to have access to that is collected by other government agencies. .. >> very interesting, very helpful, very timely. first question, as promised, i want to go back to

cybersecurity. and i'm going to ask you to -- and you can just weave in and out in responding, but a couple things i want to hear is, one, how are we doing with the follow-up on the president's executive order. how is nist doing, national institute of standards and technology, how's nist doing with respect to working on the framework, how does the private sector? what's the kind of feedback we're getting from the private sector how that is proceeding? describe, if you will, the roles, the interrelationship, the responsibilities, but the interrelationship in how you cooperate and collaborate. just talk to us about how your respective roles and how you collaborate. and finally, how could you work better together, collaborate together, collaborate smarter together x what can we do to help you in that regard? so those are a bunch of questions, but i think there's a sort of theme to it.

just give us a good update, if you will. that'll probably exhaust my seven minutes. rand, do you want to lead it off? >> thank you, sir. let me start with the executive order and the presidential policy directive. with respect to the national cybersecurity framework that nist has responsibility for drafting, the first draft of that is completed, it is available. we are seeking comment from the private sector and government officials at all levels. as well as, obviously, the congress. that draft was the result of a number of workshops and outreach efforts that involve both nist and the department of homeland security in order to find a way to make sure that we brought the best and the bright together in order to produce the framework. the final framework is due in february, and we certainly anticipate meeting that

deadline. in addition to that, we have been mapping the information-sharing networks that exist within the government we've been looking at the national infrastructure protection plan that we are responsible for, weaving cyber and physical infrastructure together. because, obviously, a cyber attack may result this physical damage just as much as it might result many in cyber damage. and all of those deadlines that were set up in the executive order have been met up-to-date. the longest poll in that -- pole the in that tent is the cyber -- excuse me, the science and technology report that we owe in a couple of years. so with respect to that, i think we're moving forward. in line with the expectations. with respect to collaboration and, obviously, director comey will comment on this as well, what we have basically instituted is a call to any one

of us, that is to the bureau, to the department of homeland security or to the national security agency will be responded to collectively because we each bring a particular expertise and particular activities that i think do allow us to most effectively help an affected business or government entity to respond to an intrusion. the bureau, obviously, has the investigative lead, and i'll let the director talk about that. our responsibility is to as quickly as possible know what happened and provide outreach to others that will help them be able to prevent the same kind of an intrusion from happening to them. and the national security agency

backs us up with all of the intelligence capabilities that they can bring to bear on an event. with respect to the legislative issue that you asked, i think while we are moving forward as we can with executive authority, we really do continue to need your support in passing that legislation. the areas that we can receive help are, firstly, on information sharing to make it easier for private sector firms to share information with us without crossing lines that are of concern to them as, for instance, with respect to personal information. we need your help in creating incentives that would help firms

adopt higher security practices in cyberspace. the framework had been a good guide on -- will be a good guide on what to do. what we need your help in is helping them realize why they need to do that. we can also benefit from additional law enforcement tools that were discussed in the draft legislation over a year ago. we also, as senator coburn has mentioned, can use an update on fisma as we have at dhs gotten additional responsibilities while omb remains in the policy lead on this as well as additional hiring flexibility to allow us to hire in the same way that the national security agency can hire cyber expertise.

and finally a national data breach reporting requirement so that we can have a national reporting requirement rather than a patchwork of state reporting requirements on personal information. all of those would go a long way and only be provided by you, the congress of the united states. let me stop there and turn it over to director comey on his -- >> rather than -- i've used up about six and a half minutes, i want to be responsible for my colleagues. i want to come back and ask you to keep that question in mind, because we'll come back in the second round and drill down on it again. dr. coburn be. >> well, thank you for your testimony. one of the concerns that if you watched at all any of the testimony yesterday and the questioning of what -- who i presume to be our new secretary is about responsiveness. and, secretary beers, we had forwarded to you all on october 18th asking information about the eb5 system, what the leg

staff here on the hill did was offered to brief us. and, of course, i don't want a briefing, i want the data, and then we'll take the briefing at we look at the data. and the problem has been at homeland security timely response to committee requests for information. and i think i got a rate firm yes from jeh johnson yesterday about being transparent with us as long as we're responsible in terms of what we're asking for. so i would hope that you would redirect the staff there to give us the information. we have a real problem on eb5s both in terms of national security and also fraud, and we need that information. i have a letter going to director comey. it went october 1st and along with senator chambliss and senator grassley in regards to that same issue and would appreciate response to that. and then, matt, we sent you

information on a questionnaire on the boston bombing, and not only did you all not respond, you didn't respond to say what you told us verbally which is that the fbi was answering for you. of for us to really have a good relationship, some of the things that have to happen is communication. and if the fbi's answering for you, you ought to say the fbi's answering for us rather than just not answer us. because all that does is raise the hair on the back of my neck, and i have a great working relationship with you through the intel committee, and i trust you immensely. but just common courtesy would tell my staff we're going to let the fbi answer that. matt, when was the last time you got actionable intelligence from a fusion center? >> other than boston. >> boston gave you information, but i'm talking actionable

intelligence. >> we work with the fusion centers really through the fbi joint terrorism task forces and through, i mentioned in my opening comments, our domestic representatives who work with the fusion centers. the fusion centers are largely there to to support what's happening at the state and local level, and they certainly serve their state and local. and i've had the opportunity to visit a number of fusion centers, and they seem to be doing a good job in that regard. it's not the case, however, that they would typically provide intelligence to, for example, me at the national counterterrorism center where we're focusing more on national-level intelligence. >> right. so the point is they're in all hazards, mainly state and local. and the fact is the majority funded by homeland security. and yet the upward flow of information that's actionable intelligence is almost nothing. and so the question is, could some of those dollars be better used as far as federal dollars at nctc or at the fbi as the

director said in terms of what we've seen in terms of sequester. i just wanted to make the point is that you haven't gotten any information that's actionable from a fusion center. and very little of it goes to the joint terrorism task force as we've investigated it. so it's not that they're not -- i'm not against them, it's that we ought to look at what they're really doing which is mainly local and state, and it has as much to do with drugs and all these other issues that local law enforcement deal with more so than counterterrorism and the terrorism threat to the country. let's talk for a minute. one of the things that has to happen on cyber it's been referred to and, secretary beers, you mentioned this, is the free flow of information from the private sector to you all. and the problem with that is, is the liability concerns on private information. so my question to each of you,

do you think it's proper that any cyber bill we put forward would create a liability protection for the private sector in terms of sharing information with the government? >> let me start, sir. that is one of the things that we want. obviously, we want to make sure together with you that the liability protection that you're talking about is carefully crafted in order to insure that it protects activity, information sharing that is legitimate under the terms of that and not a total blanket liability protection. but that is, those are the kinds of things that would help with this so that they are more willing to share that information instead of having a long conversation between lawyers about the terms of the information sharing which very much slows it down. >> right. and nobody's talking about a blanket liability.

but the fact is if a company is at risk, fiduciary risk with sharing something that the government needs on a timely basis and we haven't given adequate liability protection for that, we're never going to get the information on a timely -- we may ultimately get it, but it'll be past the point which we could have utilized it most effectively. would you agree with that? >> yes, sir. >> director comey? >> yes, senator, i would. since i was last in government, i've been the general counsel of two different private companies, and so i though the concern of the private sector is that and then a related concern, reputational damage, will the government keep their information confidential. so they're worried on both fronts. >> right. matt? >> i don't have anything to add to that. >> um, tell me about this national cyber investigative task force between dhs, fbi and nsa. we've had a couple of presentations, most of them in

closed session, and just so the american public can hear this, i was pretty impressed at the coordination and cooperation that i saw among the agencies. and if any of you would talk about that, i think it'd be very good for the american people to see that, you know, government isn't always dysfunctional. you guys are really doing some stuff together across department and agency lines, and i think hearing about that would be very reassuring to the american public. >> i can say the first word about that, senator. it was one of the first places i visited as director, was to go and see the ncijtf, and it is, as i said, a grouping of 19 agencies that all touch a piece of cyber, right? cyber is sort of, i think of it as an evil layer cake. there are terrorists, there are organized criminal groups, there are hactivists, there are identity thieves, and there are a huge number of people in government worrying about different pieces of that layer

take, but until the ncijtf was created, they were all worrying about it in ways that are inefficient and conflicting. this pulled everybody together, get them all in the same physical place so they can figure out who should work what threat and how should it be worked, and then parse that work out in the way that's most cost efficient and most effective for the american people. it is a great new story. a lot of its achievements are things we can't talk about in an open setting, but i agree with you, i think it's something the american people should be very happy about. >> let me second director comey's remarks. it is an excellent way in bringing these people together in addition to deciding who should take responsibility for a case, but to allow the people at the task force when an incident comes up to know who may have information about it and to pool that information so that when the lead investigator is determined, that that investigator has all of that information. we've had