Wanted: A Policy For Securing US Info Infrastructure

For some time, observers have been predicting that dynamic partnerships between industry and government will soon help secure the nation's all-important information infrastructure. Unfortunately, these collaborations have yet to emerge, says one former government insider, and few are on the horizon. Roger Snodgrass of the newspaper, The Los Alamos Monitor, describes in a recent article how Jeffrey Hunker, a Clinton-era critical infrastructure security advisor to the White House, laments this and other shortcomings of the state of America's cyber defenses. "What he doesn't like about the direction cyber security policy has gone is that it is still not connected and coordinated," writes Snodgrass. "The public and private partnerships that were supposed to be sharing information have not materialized."

The story, entitled: "Cyber Security Said Lagging Behind Vulnerabilities," also describes how federal officials are not keeping pace with the new style of threats that imperil not only the Web, but all of the various lines of communication so vital to the economy, the government and the wider society's as well.

"The Internet is only one of several potentially vulnerable parts of the national infrastructure, which also includes vital networks like water, power, telecommunications and railroads," writes the author.

To read the full version of the story, visit: http://www.lamonitor.com/articles/2004/06/16/headline_news/news05.txt.