Biden vows to make cybersecurity priority after America hacked
Federal authorities expressed increased alarm yesterday about an intrusion into US and other computer systems around the globe that officials suspect was carried out by Russian hackers.
The nation’s cybersecurity agency warned of a “grave” risk to government and private networks.
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said in its most detailed comments yet that the intrusion had compromised federal agencies as well as “critical infrastructure” in a sophisticated attack thatwas hard to detect and will be difficult to undo.
Cisa did not say which agencies or infrastructure had been breached or what information taken in an attack that it previously said appeared to have begun inmarch.
“This threat actor has demonstrated sophistication and complex tradecraft in these intrusions,” the agency said in its unusual alert.
“Cisa expects that removing the threat actor from compromised environments will be highly complex and challenging.”
The hack, if authorities can indeed prove it was carried out by a nation such as Russia as experts believe, creates a fresh foreign policy problem for President Donald Trump in his final days in office.
Trump, whose administration has been criticised for eliminating a White House cybersecurity adviser and downplaying Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, has made no public statements about the breach.
President-elect Joe Biden said he would make cybersecurity a top priority of his administration, but that stronger defences are not enough.
“We need to disrupt and deter our adversaries from undertaking significant cyberattacks in the first place,” he said.
“We will do that by, among other things, imposing substantial costs on those responsible for such malicious attacks, including in co- ordination with our allies and partners.”
The cybersecurity agency previously said the perpetrators had used network management software from Texas-based Solarwinds to infiltrate computer networks. Its new alert said the attackers may have used othermethods, as well.
Over the weekend, amid reports that the Treasury and Commerce departments were breached, Cisa directed all civilian agencies of the federal government to remove Solarwinds fromtheir servers.
The cybersecurity agencies of Britain and Ireland issued similar alerts.
A US official previously said Russia- based hackers were suspected, but neither Cisa nor the FBI has publicly said who is believed be responsible. Asked whether Russia was behind the attack, the official said: “We believe so. We haven’t said that publicly yet because it isn’t 100 per cent confirmed.”
Another US official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss a matter that is under investigation, said the hack was severe and extremely damaging although the administration was not yet ready to publicly blame anyone for it.
“This is looking like it’s the worst hacking case in the history of America,” the official said. “They got into everything.”
The official said the administration is working on the assumption that most, if not all, government agencies were compromised but the extent of the damage was not yet known.
Cisa officials did not respond to questions and so it was unclear what it meant by a “grave threat” or by critical infrastructure. Thedepartment of Homeland Security, its parent agency, defines such infrastructure as any “vital” assets to the US or its economy, a broad category that could include power plants and financial institutions.
AP