the cybersecurity act of 2012, authored by senators lieberman and collins, seeks to solve our cybersecurity ills but only threatens to make the situation worse. the voluntary nature the act before us, the standards within the act before us, is also questionable. any voluntary standard is one step away from mandatory in the bill. senator lieberman has already indicated that if the standards aren't voluntarily used, he would make -- he would push to make them mandatory. even more concerning, section 103-g of the act before us gives current regulators the power to make these voluntary standards mandatory. it specifically authorizes that action. if a regulator doesn't mandate the standards, the regulatory agency will have to report to congress why it didn't do so. again, strong encouragement to just make the standards mandatory and avoid a congressional inquisition." finally, the heritage foundation goes to say, "the sharing and analysis of cybersecurity threat information was weakened by confining cybersecurity information exchanges to civilian organizations. though in an ideal world the depar

secondly, any cybersecurity bill should focus on just that, cybersecurity. it should not be a back door for warrantless wiretaps or information entirely unrelated to cyber attacks. in other words, once a company gives the government cyber threat information, the government shouldn't be able to say hey, this email doesn't have a virus but it does say that michael was late on his taxes, i'm going to send that to the i.r.s. under the cybersecurity act of 2012, once a cyber exchange gets information, it can give that information to law enforcement only to prosecute or stop a cyber crime or to stop serious immediate harm to adults or serious harm to minors. cispa actually has similar protections, but secure i.t. allows a far broader range of disclosures to law enforcement. here in the senate, the cybersecurity act is the proposal that does the most to respect the spirit and letter of the fourth amendment. third, the cybersecurity bill should make it easier for a company to share information with experts in the government, but it has to hold companies who abuse th

president, i'd like to rise to discuss the cybersecurity bill. i'm very hopeful that we will pass a bill that will find a good and workable balance, one certainly that ensures that our critical infrastructure has the most effective countermeasures to prevent cyber attack but one that will also encourage our dynamic technology industry to continue to innovate, protect freedom of expression, and the privacy on the internet. let me remind my colleagues that the internet was originally developed as a way for universities, governments, and companies to collaborate on research and other projects. the whole purpose of the internet was meant to stimulate the open exchanges of ideas. as a result, it has changed the world. we've seen it. in egypt, in russia, in china, we have seen the internet, people's ability to communicate unfettered by government or other strong forces, create huge amounts of power -- good power, positive powerment now, just ask the entrepreneurs who developed a whole new way of developing products and selling services about how the in

the cybersecurity act of 2012. they've introduced an approach that is balanced, bipartisan, and responsive to legitimate concerns raised by the intelligence community, private city, -- industry, and privacy advocates. the siebd will make us safer. -- the cybersecurity act of 2012 will make us safer. pipelines, electrical grids, water treatment facilities, transportation systems, even financial networks are increasingly vulnerable to attack. bad actors in other countries have already demonstrated their ability to use the internote take control of computer systems -- internet to take control of computer systems. last year there was a 400% increase on signary tacks on the -- cyber attacks. in response to concerns raised by some in the private sect disper some on the other side -- sector and some on the other side of the aisle, senator lieberman and collins revised a section of the bill. the bill now creates a voluntary incentive-based system of performance standards. private companies and government agencies will work

prior to that, director of the national cybersecurity center. he is a technical -- i don't know, i guess the word is whiz from silicon valley originally, graduate of stanford university. our guest reporter is gautham that fresh of -- nagesh of "congressional quarterly." >> host: rod, you discussed the legislation that's currently in front of congress. specifically in the senate, we're seeing them debate a piece of legislation where the sponsors have bent over backward to try to appease some of the concerns from privacy advocates, but they've also been forced to make concessions of regulation. so what would you like to see from a cybersecurity law passed by congress, if at all this year? >> guest: you know, i have not jumped in depth, so i'm not a position to go into it in specific detail. i'm pleased to hear concessions have been made to try to strike a balance. i haven't necessarily heard that feedback from all the communities that they're content with where we've gotten to yet. i think there's more work to be done, and i think we've got to be

we're talking about cybersecurity. we talked about the dangers in cybersecurity if we don't do something about it. and he's now telling me that he wants a vote to repeal all the stuff that i just talked about, on cybersecurity? mr. president, that is very difficult to comprehend. i think we should understand that i don't think a woman getting contraception has a thing to do with shutting down the power grids in america or the financial services in america or our water systems or our sewer systems. that's what cybersecurity is all about. not whether a woman can have contraception or whether she can have a wellness check to find out she's got cancer from not having had a mammogram. mr. durbin: would the majority leader yield for a question? mr. reid: i'd be happy to yield. mr. durbin: do i remember that the very first amendment on the transportation bill was offered by senator blunt of missouri on family planning? is there a family planning amendment available on every bill now that will be offered by the republican side

and we would include in the cybersecurity basket the prosecution of a cybersecurity crime. so if, for example, a threat indicator shows that somebody illegally hacked into a spuret, we certainly should be able to prosecute the person for that illegal hacking, for that computer crime. what secure i.t. does, that's the republican alternative to the cybersecurity act, it says the government could prosecute not just the computer crimes with the information it gets but could prosecute any of the hundreds of crimes that have predicates for wiretap. some of those are not so serious. and a lot of those are nothing to do with cybersecurity. should the government be able to use information, share it for cybersecurity reasons, prosecute tax fraud, prosecute an immigration violation, prosecute someone for making a fake i.d. all of those are crimes under the secure i.d. act -- secure i.t. act that could be prosecuted with information shared for completely different reason related to cybersecurity. host: goetze go to adam in baltimore, maryland, waiting on the democratic line. you're on

prodir to that he served as director of the national cybersecurity center. he is a technical -- i don't know, from silicon valley originally he is a graduate of stanford university. our guest reporter is the ultimate ashraf reporter corker >> he discussed what is in front of congress specifically in the senate we are seeing them debate a piece of legislation where the sponsors have really been to over backwards to try to appease some of the concerns from the privacy advocates but they've also been forced to make some concessions on regulation. so, what would you like to see from a cybersecurity law passed by congress if at all this year? >> you know, i have not jumped into the current proposed legislation. so i'm not in a position to go into it in any specific detail. i am pleased to hear concessions that have been made to try to strike a balance to really haven't necessarily heard that feedback from all the communities that they are content with what they've gotten to yet so i think there is more work to be done and again i think we have to be very carefull

that isn't true, though, for cybersecurity. in this case, we can't restrict classified information tightly within government. the companies that underpin our nation's economy and way of life have a need to know about the nature of cyber attacks so they can better secure their systems. it's not sufficient for the government to be able to defend itself against an attack; it's also necessary for companies like google or an institution like nasdaq to be able to protect themselves and to use all possible defenses that we can help them provide. so, under this bill, companies are able to qualify to receive classified information. they will be certified and then able to obtain classified information about what cyber threats to look out for. fourth, the bill establishes a system through which any private-sector authority -- entity, whether a power utility, a defense contractor, a telecom company, or others, can share cyber threat information with the government. when it comes to cyber, information-sharing must be a two-way street. often

one, we absolutely must take action on cybersecurity. two, it is a genuine and undeniable matter of our american national security. and three, we cannot claim to have done the job, we cannot claim to have even have attempted the job seriously if we don't address the question of the critical infrastructure on which american life and our economy depend that is in private hands and therefore cannot be protected under the existing regime and place protecting our government and military networks. we have to solve that problem. anything that does not solve that problem is a clear failure of our duty as national security experts from republican and democratic administrations alike have very clearly explained. mr. president, let me ask unanimous consent that we proceed to a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak therein for up to ten minutes each. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. whitehouse: let me ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to calendar number 464, s. 285. the presiding officer: the clerk will

. >> from cybersecurity, i have to ask you about syria.17 months now. what exactly does u.s. intelligence know right now about the president bashar al assad, personally, and what does that portend for whether he would actually use these chemical weapons or do something else crazy, unfathomable? >> well, certainly -- first, i have to caveat my answer by reminding everyone, i'm three years out of government, so what i'm expressing are my personal views based on the observation of the situation. >> sure. >> you know, bashar al assad wouldn't be president of syria if his older brother, basel, hadn't been killed in an automobile accident. this is someone who is frankly very ill prepared for the stresses of this job. he talked reform in his first couple of years, and frankly he didn't have the force of personality to bend the alawite leadership to any sense of reform course. and now we see the regime under great stress, we see his brother-in-law killed in that explosion in damascus last week. i guess i'd summarize, brooke, by saying he is badly

we must pass cybersecurity legislation and we must ensure that the cybersecurity legislation that we pass addresses critical infrastructure. no bill that fails to address critical infrastructure can be said to have done the job of protecting our country. our nation will be vulnerable if critical infrastructure companies fail to meet basic security standards as they do right now. legislation must include a mechanism to end this continuing vulnerability. if operators object to a particular approach to cybersecurity for our critical infrastructure on the basis it is too burdensome or too unwieldy they will find many members of the senators on both sides of the aisle, myself included and senator blumenthal included, who are ready and eager to work with them. but if the purpose of the exercise is to come to an end point in which the operators of our critical infrastructure do not have to reach adequate levels of cybersecurity, then we need to move on and we need to vote and we need to go beyond that. the question of how we get to cybersecurity is one that we should engage on in this senat

argue that mandates would hurt private companies who actually cooperate with the government on cybersecurity so that connecticut senator he went back to the drawing board now in this new version a national cyber security council would work with industry groups to create voluntary standards to prevent cyber attacks and we were makes it clear that he wants this to be his legacy before he retires at the end of his legislative session so in a press conference we were going to once again explain why he thinks we need these protections in place and why it has to happen now but think it was less of an explanation and one of an opportunity to fear monger. we did not want to lose the chance to pass cyber security legislation this year that could prevent or it secretary panetta warned about which is cyber nine eleven or nine eleven pearl harbor before it actually happens. yeah that's right the senator cited defense secretary leon panetta is warning of a nine eleven pearl harbor one problem they are an e-mail about is a panetta never really said that turns out that a former cia officer hinted at it at

hypothetical doomsday scenarios he just might come up with just to make sure that some type of cybersecurity bill gets signed before he hangs up his hat maybe go back a hundred years took a heartstrings of americans and predicts titanic situation or if you think that's too far in the past maybe i'll go the nuclear route for his due date scare tactics if cybersecurity legislation needs to be pushed again with lieberman dare suggest a cure noble hiroshima disaster now i'm not trying to make light of these events but c'mon guys this fear mongering is completely out of hand this is how bad legislation gets passed and this is how rights get trampled on when you put fear and panic into the mix you think would have learned that by now after the last ten years believe it sees that clock ticking so he decides to give his efforts a little nudge even if it means painting a really scary hyperbolic picture in your mind so maybe maybe just maybe he's read of the joy to cybersecurity lobbying group out there i don't know but we're taking it to the extremes just to make sure that he could live up to his leg

and that's cybersecurity. and what more we need to do in that area we are facing an enormous challenge from china, somewhat more sophisticated operation out of russia and some of our allies are active in this role. what sorts of things do you think need to be done to increase the security of our communications? especially as we move more and more to the cloud? >> cyber is the most national security problem faces us. i think people don't really understand the degree to which these intrusions are made. because a lot of them are classified and can't be released. and in the private sector, banks, for example, that are robbed, like the royal bank of scotland of $10 million i can't remember if it was $8 or $10 million. it was in 2008 from 250atm. they didn't want the clients to know that. city bank $10 million. they didn't want their clients to know that. so cyber attacks on company after company by the thousands that people adopt know about -- don't know about it becomes extraordinarily difficult you get to critica

we have been involved in cybersecurity ever since the first cybersecurity bill which the proponents had the internet kill switch. that provision is no longer on the table. the sponsors agree it was a bad idea. it would have given the president the power to order the stoppage or limitation of internet communications coming to, from, or over critical infrastructure. critical infrastructure will probably include internet backbone systems. host: do other versions have that kill switch as a part of it? is a competing senate version. guest: no other bill has that feature. the kill switch has been killed. host: marco from new york this morning. caller: good morning. i wanted to ask, how do you feel about the anonymous -- host: i think we lost you, marco. we will try to get him back. alan from florida. are you there? we are losing. caller: i have a question dealing with psychological profiling on the internet. and also, the internet was used here in florida where they left out key components in the software to present gerrymandering. that is my question -- how the government can manipulate our

and looking o do on cybersecurity but what we're looking for was common ground. john mccain siting to yft chan o u naru collins, to try to see if the pen couldn't give us some ideas of what we could do to find 80% orthe subject of which we agree on and do that. this year not was more time. so ireally would like tak tiotlyor mr. skinner but also for congresswoman harman and admiral allen, interns when you take different approaches between the two major bills are in the senate, bipartisan bill and the wo owhr inndh trh gis omdve on how to meld these together in ways that make sense and get that done this year. >> well, bring back the big four. that would be my first answer. t,ortei k uphis debate that we keep having about the role of government. i think the argument that the better bill sponsors make is that infraructure hato ei th biif eeteg r atai rcafruc wen otng country. i'm there. i think that's right. i don't think it's a republican or demratic argument. i think it is a proper role of government to provide fothe common defense. it in th osittion. 'so t a y a

i think about cybersecurity cybersecurity, globalization and intellectual capital and property. i think about american in treasurys and who will buy them and able to blackmail each other but we could do that. not depend on how risk averse you are and what kind of decision you like. you prefer to live? most people do. we will die at some point* we could do the actuarial tables. that does remind me a gentleman who asked me a question and he said you think in our lifetime we will see reunification of korea? i said which lifetime? [laughter] >> because like president obama talk that the u.s. does not seek to contain china but it it seems you try to reinforce the strategies to contain china. what do describe? >> the problem with u.s. strategy the chinese are not stupid or week. we could if they were stupid or if they had no choice. but the chinese understand with the policies we talk about are not to china's benefit. for us to combat them with china and japan and the rest of among the negroes what to rethink? with it should apply we would like the chinese to adapt behavior's if they

. >> i want to ask you about your cybersecurity bill which passed a very important procedural hurdle yesterday but first, with mitt romney going to israel and sheldon adelson suggesting he's going to be there and he's going to raise a lot of money to try to drum up support, get the jewish vote for romney against president obama, do you think it's a problem that president obama has not been to israel in his first term? >> well, i think it does bother some people who are pro-israel, not just jewish people who are pro-israel but a lot of non-jews, christians particularly, of course, who are as well. but president obama's not the first president not to visit israel in his first four years. if there's a problem in the pro-israel community in the u.s. toward the president, it's about some of the policies such as the call for the freeze in building in jerusalem and the west bank and the reference to the borders. that will all be debated in the campaign and people will make their judgment. >> i want to ask you about the cybersecurity legislation, because this is a compromise bill. the white

house so it's closest to suspend that it's the same basic idea it's about letting people share cybersecurity information more easily but it doesn't have some of the most egregious provisions in that bill like you mentioned it has saved cards in place in response to the popular uprising about the bill but what it doesn't do is it doesn't change the fundamental approach of the bill it still says what we need is another government agency whose job is to collect information about americans in order to stop some sort of terrorist threat from the internet and doesn't attack the real problem of cyber security threats which is that the government groups like the n.s.a. been funding. in the creation of vulnerabilities in our computer systems and exploiting them for their own purposes in till we stop that until the government stops funding cyber security holes it seems a bit ridiculous to say that the solution in the cyber security is more spying and collecting more data about america but what are the implications of transferring that power away from the national security agency to a civilian agency.

he mentioned cybersecurity. why isn't it on the floor? defense authorization, why isn't it on the floor? appropriations bills, why don't we call them up? these are not partisan bills. they're widely supported. they are the basic work of government, including the budget. and i understand his view is that the parliamentarian is wrong, that we really did pass a budget. but the budget could be done with a simple majority. the appropriations bills are not partisan in nature. if there are differences in the 302-b's, they would be worked out in conference, which is the way we did it for years. we have followed the regular order occasionally, and when we have, senators have been involved. they were relevant in the process. i'll give you five examples. the export-import bank reauthorization, trade adjustment assistance, patent reform, f.a.a. reauthorization, the highway bill, and the farm bill were all examples of when senators were made relevant by the fact that we took up bills that actually came out of committees that were worked on by members

and i will tell you that at the top of the list is cybersecurity. senator kyl is wrking veryhard fompsethyhousa bue ri fhe iti think include cybersecurity and postal. incidentally, to say what i think all the witnesses know, but can't be said too much, just reflecting on your strong statements about the ned to ha a cerseriillop noteworthy that this really is, unfortunately there seems to be somewhat of a partisan divid on this questi here in congress. among those who avehadt reonsilior natna last two administrations, that is the bush and obama administrations, there is ral unanimity of opinion that we've got to adopt a bill, and i think if i'm not stretching to say that they support a bl like e on tht cam oto it s's ou people in the current administration and the president, but secretar chertoff, admiral mcconnell likeleisure college, admiral allen, and stewart baker so heg sge0veshema senate. >> we've said your leadership, senator collins, our leadership on posted of the only way w thinthere's a postal bill is to gt on thne,te d edot. ine iueth be

so that all sounds great but privacy advocates are still skeptical to talk more about the cybersecurity bill aaron swartz founder of demand progress joins us now aaron welcome so on the surface this seems like a step in the right direction in protecting answering that freedoms what do you think well i mean it's certainly good that they've made these improvements to the bill and like you said it has a lot of protections for privacy that weren't there before but there's still the fundamental question of why we need a bill like this at all i mean obviously if we are going to have a bill it's better than it has privacy protections than the previous bill which you know actually trampled on privacy in all sorts of ways but the government still hasn't explained why we need this and you know even of a civilian agency to monitor all our cyber communications against some sort of nonexistent threat i mean how would you compare this bell to other some of the more controversial pieces of legislation so. the latest to pass the house so it's closest to suspend that it's the same basic idea it's about

again i think cybersecurity.adding industrialized and globalization and the moving of intellectual capital and property away from american people and american companies. i think about american treasuries and who's going to buy them and the ability to economically blackmail each other in the eyes of the punched in the face, too. we've shown it before. so it depends on -- i guess it depends on how risk-averse you are as a person, what kind of decisions you like. >> i prefer to live. >> you prefer to live, most people do. we all are going to die at some point. we can do the actuarial tables and mass data into. it does remind me of an older gentleman when asking a question about north korea looking at the transition was to reappear the guy was about 80 years old. he said do you think in our lifetimes will ever see reunification of korea? i asked which of our lifetimes every time. i won't go there, sir. >> i want to know because people like president obama, the outcome talk about the u.s. is not to seek to contain chi

brown: madam president, we will continue to debate the cybersecurity bill tomorrow. senators will be notified when votes are scheduled. if there's no further business to come before the senate, i ask that it adjourn under the previous order. the presiding officer: the senate stands adjourned until 10:00 a.m. tomorrow. >> the internet brings radical transparency to almost everything it touches. privacy, it becomes a construct. it's an artificial construct. very important one, created by laws and institutions and enforcement. >>> until a few weeks ago, rod beckstrom oversaw the domain names worldwide for assigned names and numbers. tonight, an inside look at the internet and cybersecurity on "the communicators" at 8 eastern on c-span2. >>> we did not begin as a city in kentucky. there was only a vague native american region and later a county in another state called kentucky. we began in 1778 as virginia. >>> this weekend, join booktv, american history tv, and c-span's local content vehicles in law louisville, kentucky. biography john david dyke and rebooting american

chief is calling on congress to move ahead with cybersecurity regulation and he promises they won't be reading your e-mails but somehow find that one hard to believe less if you want to know how many new contracts the pentagon is getting in this age of austerity but we have a pretty shocking list for you just from two weeks we'll have all of that work in a night including a dozen happy hour but first take a look what the mainstream media decided to miss. all right so i know that i use this term all the time but if you ever needed a quick easy very clear example that the mainstream media loves nothing more than horse race political coverage today is the day. the presidential race deadlocked president obama and governor romney are deadlocked at forty seven percent among registered voters president obama and mitt romney ties forty seven percent president obama taking his middle class tax cut pitch to iowa the race for the white house apparently a dead heat according to a new poll just out offers president obama and mitt romney to battleground states their target taxes of the middle class

>> i think thetechnical expertise on cybersecurity is in the nsa. the a i shouldem thee. rmf being the public face to do the cybersecurity work that is not in the, in the dot.mil and dot -- we, espeallyn theot go e, i think the homeland department has to do it, implement it. but i don't think it should try to recreate the chnical expertise of thensa. >> i think there's a role for government in oversight the ans. c gyonal owrenter that failed in the deepwater hidessen spill two years ago was built to industry standards, was not subject to independent third party inspection mandated by the governme it is now. so i think we need to understand what ishe rolef gvernnt, ho d pceheec ovghsh thit's logical it should be the department of homeland security. how you evolve the standards can be, you know, part of how the legislation is put together, but that has to be affirmed, there has to beaccountability, and somebody has to be aware on haf thamanpl kaha >>el i g te a collaborative effort. i believe nsa and nsit plays a role as far as establishing standards, and those standards ar

with cybersecurity, the time to start," he says, "was yesterday." former assistant secretary for policy at the department of homeland security baker, "we must begin now to protect our critical infrastructure from attack. a great number of national security officials, bipartisan, wrote a letter to us in the senate saying "the threat is only going to get worse. inaction is not an acceptable option." and protection -- "protection of our critical infrastructure is essential." "essential in order to effectively protect our national security from the growing cyber threat." as i said earlier in introducing senator mikulski again, there is indeed a market failure that has been identified in a bipartisan fashion. the facts prove it because so often when either public or private-sector folks respond to an intrusion they find that 90% of the time the company had no idea it had been hacked. even the u.s. chamber of commerce had been hacked and the chinese had full access to its computers for months. when the aurora bug hit google and others, only three other co

he mentioned cybersecurity. why isn't it on the floor? defense authorization, why isn't it on the floor? appropriations bills, why don't we call them up? these are not partisan bills. they're widely supported. they are the basic work of government, including the budget. and i understand his view is that the parliamentarian is wrong, that we really did pass a budget. but the budget could be done with a simple majority. the appropriations bills are not partisan in nature. if there are differences in the 302-b's, they would be worked out in conference, which is the way we did it for years. we have followed the regular order occasionally, and when we have, senators have been involved. they were relevant in the process. i'll give you five examples. the export-import bank reauthorization, trade adjustment assistance, patent reform, f.a.a. reauthorization, the highway bill, and the farm bill were all examples of when senators were made relevant by the fact that we took up bills that actually came out of committees that were worked on by members

we have over 100 universities during information, cybersecurity. take the best of that and put on the table and that we got to educate the teacher force, and we need to do that. situational awareness. how do you see cyberspace cracks think about that. if she got a group of folks together and said to me at the turn of cyberspace and what's that mean? show me what you are talking about, you are saying you got this different type of invulnerability. what does that mean? how do you see that. how do we share information between government departments? how do we share information between the government and industry and how we do that in the way that such the american people know they are protecting their civil liberties and privacy. this is a great case in point. to the different types of now where there are getting into your system they have a number of ways of doing it. they are not reading your e-mail per say. they're looking at the stream of the the that is coming in, looking for signatures or ports are different types of activities. and if they see

he mentioned cybersecurity. why isn't it on the floor?defense authorization, why isn't it on the floor? appropriations bills, why don't we call them up? these are not partisan bills. they're widely supported. they are the basic work of government, including the budget. and i understand his view is that the parliamentarian is wrong, that we really did pass a budget. but the budget could be done with a simple majority. the appropriations bills are not partisan in nature. if there are differences in the 302-b's, they would be worked out in conference, which is the way we did it for years. we have followed the regular order occasionally, and when we have, senators have been involved. they were relevant in the process. i'll give you five examples. the export-import bk mentexport-import bk ..nce, patent reform, f.a.a. reauthorization, the highway bill, and the farm bill were all examples of when senators were made relevant by the fact that we took up bills that actually came out of committees that were worked on by members of both parties, that

lpotnas op taapit detmtst in cybersecurity, cybersystems and space technology. pealprtaon rid mo pdet o the institute, my special pleasure to welcome the chairman of the institute of peace, . la thank you. mr. secretary, ladies and gentlemen, i am the chrman of the bod of directors of th institute ce oehf -cmaoroond isthftctin y. we are delighted to welcome you to the george shultz great hall where you are right now. ste eaauarters of the ac toangop o tt i ledth beumtohe great presidents as well as the war memorials to those who sacrificed themselves to protect this ti. it atntwa d ld suses t wld thas aie through public/private partnership. congress was supportive as was the prive sector including some leading corporations. on t fstt iclppoheches ivate citizens contribute personal effort and funds to complete the project. tonight's speaker was a tireles dee ig a wareorto lyrar t st. e sotu w established to recognize a great figure in the conduct of america's relations with the world. he was present at the aewatnaseri cttofrthsi e he enlightened, imaginative and

and what i've seen in recent times in going to a lot of cybersecurity events recently is that there doesn't seem to be an urgency to this legislation, that there's a lot of people talking about it, but nothing's being done. in the meantime, putin is now president of russia again and he's not sitting by and letting cyber attacks go by, and china, of course, doesn't need guidance. they just -- so when are we going to get serious about it, and does the president have to have a cyber summit where he gets all the, the congress together and say, look, pass this bill? >> well, there's so many things i could say. i'm trying not to get in trouble. i think this time of year politically very difficult to move things through congress, but my experience in working with both sides, both the republicans and the democrats, see this is a key issue. and the key problem that i see is, how do we help articulate what's in that legislation. i'm getting a lot of calls from both sides, and from my perspective, they do want to push this. i do think it's hard, because there are some fundamental disagreements. and i

cybersecurity a is autumn can of new words.today the senate works to address this problem, a problem national security experts call the most urgent threat to our country. that is, weeknesse weaknesses ir defense against a cybersecurity attack. it could affect our nuclear grid, energy pipelines, transportation net wherebies, communications equipment, financial systems, just to name a future general martin dempsey, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff has said, "a cyber attack should 1207 this country in its tractions. it doesn't just threaten our national security. it threatens our economic security as well. hackers have already attacked one of the most important businesses we have in america today, the nasdaq stock exchange. major corporations are under atake every day spending millions and millions of dollars to protect against cyber attacks. these attacks cost our economy billions of dollars a year and thousands of jobs. general james clapper, director of national intelligence, said chinese cyber threat of american intellect

we had them in a facility in the capitol; about cybersecurity. over the last few days some of my republican colleagues suggested the senate should delay action on what national security experts have called the most pressing threat facing this country. instead of considering bipartisan cybersecurity legislation, they say we should first consider the annual defense authorization bill. i argue we need to move rapidly to address a gaping hole in our defenses against cyber attack. the director of the f.b.i., robert mueller, said that cyber threats will soon overtake terrorism as the most significant threat to our national security, and in the minds of some, mr. president, it's difficult to separate cybersecurity and with a people are trying to do and try to do every day, it's the same as terrorism. it's just a different form. a bipartisan group of national security experts led by former executive homeland security michael chertoff -- by the way, a republican -- and former director of national intelligence mike mcconnell appointed during the republican

program it comes just two years after the launch of a six hundred fifty million pounds national cybersecurity program but progress according to the m.p.'s on the committee has been slow the national security strategy ranks the threat of cyber attacks alongside that of terrorism and yet this committee of m.p.'s seems fully prepared to engage in itself this despite the fact that the report says the communications agency g c h q believes eighty percent of cyber attacks all preventable basic measures like using security software and proper part. sober attacks of course have another name hacking it's illegal in most countries including the u.k. and britain has its first hacking case is currently in the courts including that of autism suffer a gary mckinnon he's been voicing his extradition to the us for hacking into the pentagon's computer system for ten years now so far his government has refused to protect him maybe if state sponsored hacking becomes the norm that will change. right there were no cyber wars on our website only the latest news and videos. there are more than a third of japanese c

have you know these people in washington these elected lawmakers working together in the name of cybersecurity you know oftentimes they're coming up with legislation to deal with this but it turns out they're not exactly representing the desires of their constituents there was a recent poll done this was done i think by united technologies in the national journal congressional connection and basically found that two thirds of people said that government and businesses should not be allowed to share information they're concerned rightfully so i think about privacy and civil liberties so what about this sort of this connection i guess between the people and their elected officials when it comes to cyber security and some of this action being taken to deal with this. i mean i think that is. one of the roles of our elected leaders pressure on these companies to tell us their requests to more accountability and transparency i think you saw that with the cell phone surveillance so the only reason we know anything about the volume of surveillance requests that stuff of comes getting is because of one

me when i attend these things is how many sort of the same faces you see i know that i was at a cybersecurity conference and michael chertoff was there so a lot of these people sort of come in and out i know in your article you talk about the company for dushan net and how it was founded by an f.b.i. veteran back in two thousand and two and you know soon after it started businesses grew and profits skyrocketed skyrocketed i'm wondering i mean are you suggesting that surveillance by law enforcement has sort of become its own industry. i think that i think it i think it was you know i think that there's always been a revolving door between government and private industry and surveillance is no different you know i again there's been no no one has accused edition or star of doing anything improperly but again just the sense of their large databases combined with their business of handling surveillance requests i mean that people call for accountability and transparency but you talk about this revolving door i mean do you think that people are aware of it and do you think people should be concern

serious about passing anything it's this less minute tacking of the the magazine ban on to the cybersecurity bill if anything is going to guarantee the bill won't pass it's that amendment yeah certainly we know for various reasons possibly notably the power of the n.r.a. that looks at any sort of limits on guns or in this case any nation will just generate too much controversy what do you think they did i mean why did they put i mean i know certainly we had this in the well i mean it soon it's a really it's a it's a ridiculous meaningless amendment i mean it's essentially saying we're going to rely on maniacs and terrorists not to bother to reload not to bother to carry a spare magazine it's a it's a moronic amendment and it's being attached to a bill that is an important bill i mean it's not a wonderful bill the way it stands it needs to be modified and debated but tacking on a weapons ban to something completely disconnected from weapons is just a i mean it's typical congress i was going to say it seems a little crazy for the firm and the majority of americans right it is the way washingto