Industry heads come together to stop cyberattacks

By DIANE FRANK
Federal Computer Week, 02/24/2000

WASHINGTON, D.C. - More than 200 vendors this week took the first step toward creating structures and practices that will help government protect the nation's infrastructure from cyberattacks.

The vendors, from all eight sectors of the economy classified as critical by Presidential Decision Directive 63, a directive issued in 1998 that requires agencies to protect their critical information systems and infrastructures against cyberattacks, came together to discuss the new Partnership for Critical Infrastructure Security.

This first partnership meeting comes on the heels of a White House cybersecurity summit held last week by President Clinton after cybervandals carried out a denial-of-service attack against several high-profile e-commerce Internet sites. At the summit, administration officials told industry leaders that they have a significant role to play in the security of the nation's infrastructure since they own most of it.

The industry-led partnership was formed in December under the leadership of the Commerce Department. A critical part of the effort will be sharing information, including potential vulnerabilities, research and development, and best practices, across all eight infrastructure sectors, said Ken Watson, manager of critical infrastructure protection at Cisco Systems Inc. and co-chairman of the partnership's organization committee.

Although following through on the required level of information sharing is easier said than done, there is virtually unanimous support for the effort, Watson said. "Everyone was very eager to do our part, to help defend the cyberspace," he said.

The partnership's five committees are:

Interdependency and vulnerability analysis
Information sharing and awareness
Legislative and regulatory issues
Research and development and work force development.
Organization issues

Task forces covering specific issues will be formed during the next five months.