What is new. Almost any entry code has 1 billion possible ways of being failed, or there abouts. Did you know that. Nothing is fail safe.

So the federal government keeps leaving its "cyber doors" wide open - and intruders keep getting into government computers - so now they are going to "solve" this problem by passing a bunch of meaningless laws, creating yet another layer of bureaucracy within the vaunted DHS, and telling all of us who have been successfully protecting our networks and systems for years how we now need to do our jobs. Hot dog!

China ?....our buddies are a threat ?...really ? Could we have a Senate sub-committee study that ? .....after the fact of course.

i'd worry more about 12/21/2012life on earth will not be the same

Come on, you can't tell me that with all of the CIA, NSA wizards and computer science professors out there in the US, we can't come up with secure US DOD computer systems?

Why are those critical government computers connected to the public Internet anyway? What not on a more secure private network where they'd presumably be immune from outside attack?

First of all, why are we doing so much business with China? It is totally rediculous that we trust a foreign country to make so many products that are sent here. Now, here is the result. The very one that we giving all this business to, is the one we have to fear! Totally and absolutely INSANE.....

Ahh, it gets even better. Who better than the NSA to monitor our computer traffic. Oh and don't mind the additional 2,000 government jobs needed to manage the program.

What ever happened to the idea of smaller government. I wonder if Haliburton has a subsidiary that will help the government out with this.

President Bush and his people want american people to focus on other part of the world, but not on Iraq. ANd they chose China. First was the made-in-China. When that was fading after mattel appolozied, they told media that China is the major threat in cyberspace.
Come on, Who are they trying to foo? Let us focus on the war on Iraq, Shall we?

A viwer

I submit a vote of "no confidence" in my country's government... God help us all.

Welcome in the NEXT ATTACK upon the internet... all in the name of PROTECTING YOU (of course!) Bush will attempt to clamp down on free flowing communication.... mark my word.

keep the nation terrified... pump billions into monitoring everyones personal liberties under the guise of protection... repeat

If you are concerned about cyberwar, just wait until the 2008 election! Who's
turn is next, Florida had a chance; then
Ohio. Who will be next on the NRC agenda? Time for the people to wake up and throw the scroundels out!

keep the nation terrified... pump billions into monitoring everyones personal liberties under the guise of protection... repeat

mantra from a well known fascist

I am almost convinced that all the above cyncism about this being a distraction for the current Administration may be true.
Still there is one factor overlooked.
Richard Clark I believe, was at odds with this administration and was in escence driven out as the Head of the "Terrorist" watchdog agency because of his warnings.
If you listen to him, he has been pointing to this for some time. His latest novel "BreakPoint", while a crumby bit of writing, warns of this very thing. A grain of salt.

Why are we not confronting them head on? We do trade with them then why are we not doing trade with someone else?

This is like blaming the bridge collapse on the pigeon poops.

The story about Chinese hacking of American computer systems is incomplete. Tell the rest of the story. How Bill Clinton de-classified computer technology and then gave it to the Chinese. How among other things, that technology is no doubt being used to improve guidance systems of Chinese nuclear weapons delivery systems. Tell us how Bill Clinton sold us out!

Much of America's critical infrastructure is privately owned - Banks, Utilities, etc. We as citizens should insist that computer products be tested by independent 3rd parties like NSS Labs prior to installing them in critical infrastructure.

There are so many new technologies whose development has been outsourced. Plus, China in particular loves to pirate software and reverse engineer computer hardware (such as Cisco Routers).

The administration was warned formally in early 2002 by leading scientists in the industry. And the warnings started by Dick Clarke and others long before then. So this isn't a diversion by the administration. This is an administration that has been asleep at the wheel and is finally waking up. And before we go blaming Bush alone, Dick Clarke was there warning Clinton before him and Clinton did nothing either.

I love these scare tactics the news organizations employ to get readers. Terror doesnt exist on the internet

The DoD has a secure system. It's called the SiprNet, and it's used for information that is classified. It does not have connectivity to the Internet, so if you made every DoD employee use this network and did away with the unclassified network, they would have to do what they did in the days before they had internet access - work! The civilian companies that are responsible for maintaing the primary backbone of the internet should be given the legal authority - with immunity from lawsuits - to sever the connections to China at the first sign of a possible cyber attack. If enough events happen that there starts to be an impact on the Chinese economy, maybe they will decide to play nice.

Here we go again. This administration can't be replaced soon enough. Remember when the U.S. government resembled a democracy?

ttch-"This is like blaming the bridge collapse on the pigeon poops."

LOL you got that right!!

This is old news...the military has substantial computer response units. Bottom line is that networks are not defendable. I guess the government can stand up a new agency hire 5000 people can claim that they did something, so that when it does happen and everything goes bad, they can claim, "we were trying to fix the problem..."

Why aren't we hiring hackers instead of placing them in jail? They are the ones that can find a backdoor to anything! Hire them to come and fix the stuff. At least it would be done right, we all know that the goverment can't handle it. Atleast not correctly.

How new is this news? Why is it being put into the "news hole" at this time? What other Internet happenings are afoot? Any regulatory or tax measures?

Why is everyone so surprised by these ghosts of terror? If there are any of you out there who would remove your heads from the noose of the problems of this world and look to the Bible, you would find what the future of the world is - as well as your own future.

Jesus battled terrorists during his ministry. He has the answers, if you search for them.

Sure,it is another "Saddam Hussein is trying to acquire weapons of mass distruction!

Are we kidding ourselves? Our politicians at all level are all crooked and untrustworthy. They only look out for their best interests which are money (Greed), power. We're rotten from within.

Seems strange that so many are willing to discount the threat of domestic terrorism simply because Bush says it exists and yet these are the same people that want us to spend billions on global warming because Al Gore says so….. Terrorism is a much more real and immediate threat than global warming.

Simple enough to defeat. Stop trading with an enemy who has stated a number of times it intends to attack us with nukes, intends to undermine our economy and destroy us. What part of that do you have a problem understanding? THEY are the ENEMY, and no part of our bribery is going to make them change their stripes. They are a Communist country, and Communists are bent on turning the world into a dictatorship. Has 60 years of history taught you nothing? Sheesh!

This fascinates me: government computer networks (except just perhaps DoD) are among the LEAST secure in the nation, and yet we have government making all these pronouncements of threat and trying to engineer "fixes" to problems that often have already been solved in industry and in academia. Cyber attack is not new: we have been battling it (and getting better and better at that) since before the Code Red worm in 2001. But it seems that whenever this insane administration shouts "terrorism" a whole gaggle of self-proclaimed sideline "experts" stand up to tell us all that this is more real than actual threats like global warming. These Sunday couch-quarterbacks actually deserve this administration: I just wish the rest of us did not have to endure their co-dependent folly.

Oh, Gee a new fake threat to our nation. Well, we better start monitoring all communications between US and China now. So anyone I.M.'ing your buddy in China, watch out....big brother is listening because you guys might be planning to shut down the power. Gimme a break...another guise to enact more power.

Several thoughts: 1) For as ominous as this threat may be, let us not forget the Chinese economy is chugging along due to our market buying anything coming from China through "Wal Mart", "Target", etc, therefore, shutting our economy down would not be in their best economic interest; 2) We won't say much to the Chinese about this (or any other threat they represent) because we need them to buy our debt; 3) Therefore, a symbiotic relationship has resulted where death to one results in death to the other. If we, as American citizens, really wanted to do something about this, stop buying with credit cards, start saving money in American banks (so it can be loaned to to other Americans), start buying American Treasury notes, and start shopping American (even if that means on a very local level). We, the people, are going to be the only ones who can take back this power, our policitians (of all political stripes) have vested interests that do not serve us, the citizens.

And to think, most Americans support this stuff from China by buying all the "Made in China" crap from WalMart, et al. You know, the toys with lead paint, toothpaste with anti-freeze, pet food with poison, etc. People buy this crap because it's a little cheaper, so Americans are put out of work, and it supports these wonderful efforts from China.

This is a sticky one... to shut down trade to China means to close down all Walmarts across the country. You want to see civil unrest? Walmart has consumed all small mom & pop stores in its path like Star Trek's Borg...there is nothing to replace it for all too many communities in America.

It's a real problem and should be dealt with to protect our infracture

Nothing new! This has been going on for a LONG time. Most Favored trading partner has become the enemy and still we trade with them! Wake up and smell the roses. Buy American!!!

I propose a moratorium upon ALL goods manufactured and imported from China. Close ALL trade with them and maybe the American workforce will come back to its former glory. Mark my words, if we do not China will be the death of America.

BURN THE WITCH!!
BURN THE WITCH!!

(PS - the American workforce's "glory" was that they were mostly undocumented and illiterate Germans, Italians, and Irishmen could be depended upon to work 12 hour days for $1.50 a week and mow the boss's lawn on their day off. Was your daddy Henry Frick? Mine sure wasn't.)

This has nothing to do with your home Internet. This is all about hacking into Power plants and government files. Yes, you actually can shut down half of the United States power grid by hacking, but it probably will not happen.

For about a year now the former Chief Strategist of Netscape has been warning everyone through his articles that this was a huge threat and actually identified several strategies and tactics that if used would compromise the information infrastructure in the U.S. and globally. Why is it our intelligence services are just waking up to this threat? Why is it throughout history we ignore or dismiss the experts until it is too late! I just did a Google search (Kevin Coleman Cyber Attack) and found over 13,000 references. With that much intelligence we should be much further along in protecting and defending against cyber attacks that we are today!