Center for Infrastructure Protection & Homeland Security

In the News – This Week in Critical Infrastructure: Week of April 17, 2017

This Week in Critical Infrastructure we bring you editorials on the dams and water sectors, reports from the United States and Australia on cyber defense, and some looks at the latest tools and policy directions in the U.S. and U.K.


Energy Department Exercise Reveals ‘Gaps’ in Major Cyber Incident Response

Morgan Chalfant, writing for The Hill, describes a report released by the Energy Department on Tuesday on the outcomes of an exercise performed in December 2016. The exercise, titled “Liberty Eclipse,” was designed to assess the grid security and assurance capacity of the U.S. electric system against a cyber attack.

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DHS Secretary Kelly: ‘No more muskets … federal cybersecurity needs heavy artillery’

In a speech delivered Tuesday evening, Secretary John Kelly of the Department of Homeland Security laid out the priorities facing the department moving forward. In the speech, Kelly departed the administration’s recent focus on immigration to stress the importance of cybersecurity, noting the increased frequency of attacks and intrusion attempts in recent years.

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Cyber Threats are Growing More Serious, and Artificial Intelligence Could Be the Key to Security

From CNBC, Saheli Roy Choudhury writes on the potential for machine learning to improve cybersecurity.
Through an examination of a program conducted by Darktrace, a UK firm, Choudhury describes how AI-driven defenses modeled on the human immune system may provide new tools in cyber defense.

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Gene Guilford: Common Sense and Action Needed on U.S. Critical Infrastructure, Like Oroville Dam

In this editorial, Gene Guilford, executive director of the U.S. Society on Dams, discusses the potential impact of infrastructure failures like the Oroville Dam and how this near-disaster should affect the national discussion of critical infrastructure going forward.

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Protecting Vital Water Infrastructure

From CSO, Brian Harrell, a Director on the risk management, compliance and security team of Navigant’s Energy Practice, writes on the vulnerability of the water and wastewater sector. Noting that the energy sector has occupied the majority of critical infrastructure headlines in recent years, Harrell lays out a case for greater attention to water systems.

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Aussie Critical Infrastructure Organisations in the Cyber Firing Line

On April 19, the Australian government released a first-of-its-kind survey of Australian government and industry firms describing the preparedness and threats facing cyber assets in Australia. The survey found that around 90 percent of organizations surveyed had faced an intrusion attempt, with 58 percent saying that they had suffered at least one successful intrusion attempt.

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