WASHINGTON-Central Intelligence Agency Director John Deutch said telecommunications networks and other key infrastructures controlled by computers may be vulnerable to terrorist attack.
The intelligence community and law enforcement are taking a keen interest in information warfare in light of the increasing reliance by the public, business and military on computer networks for telecommunications, financial transactions, energy distribution, air traffic control, emergency medical service and transportation.
A recent government investigation found the Pentagon victimized by computer hackers, and just last week the Secret Service charged two New Yorkers with stealing 80,000 cellular phone numbers.
“I … am concerned that this connectivity and dependency make us vulnerable to a variety of information warfare attacks,” said Deutch in written testimony from a June 25 hearing before the Senate Government Affairs subcommittee on investigations.
Deutch said a classified report produced last summer by the National Intelligence Council that focussed on foreign efforts to disrupt the public telephone network and Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems that run electric power plants, oil refineries and other utilities offers reason for concern.
Deutch said that while the study found evidence of information warfare limited to battlefield settings, he believes there are broader implications for advanced societies, like the United States, which depend on telecommunication and computer networks.
“International terrorist groups clearly have the capability to attack the information infrastructure of the United States, even if they use relatively simple means,” said Deutch.
Deutch said the CIA is working with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Justice Department, the Department of Defense and others to better understand the issue by improving data collection and trying to forge ties with the private sector.
But businesses, according to Deutch, are not fond of sharing information with government agencies because it might harm consumer confidence.
Indeed, the Clinton administration failed to win to support for its “Clipper Chip” encryption policy after civil libertarians raised privacy concerns and the computer industry objected to export controls.
“These information attacks, in whatever form, could not only disrupt our daily lives, but also seriously jeopardize our national or economic security,” said Deutch. “Without sufficient planning as we build these systems, I am also concerned that the potential for damage could grow in the years ahead.”
Sam Nunn (D-GA.), ranking minority member of the Senate intelligence subcommittee, said that each new cyberspace attack “highlights the need for intelligence, for policy and for response planning.”
Peter Neumann, of SRI International’s Computer Science Laboratory, said “today’s infrastructure is seriously flawed and seriously at risk.”
