Google Hack Presents Challenge, Opportunity For Schmidt
White House Cybersecurity Coordinator Howard Schmidt has not even been on the job for a month, and he already has a high-profile case to wield as evidence that the government must guard its own computer data and that of America's private sector.
On Jan. 12, Google announced in its company blog that it was a victim of a sophisticated hack against 21 companies in mid-December, apparently an attempt to access e-mail accounts of Chinese human rights activists. In defiance of the Chinese government, the company threatened to uncensor search engine data about subjects like the 1989 Tiananmen Square protest, and announced it might withdraw from China altogether.
President Obama entered office promising to make cybersecurity a national priority, and he appointed Schmidt as the highest-ranking government cyber official ever. Highlighting the Google issue could be a potent catalyst for reform, according to James Lewis, a senior fellow on cybersecurity with the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"Google is a very glamorous case," Lewis said. "And they went public with it, which almost never happens when a company's information gets hacked. And the U.S. has suffered probably massive losses from Chinese hacks for more than 10 years now."
Andre DiMino, co-founder of the cyber attack watchdog group the Shadowserver Foundation, said he hopes the Google hack will make Schmidt and the White House pay closer attention.
"There's a lot of financial fraud and identity theft being targeted at U.S. banks, but that's not getting attention," DiMino said. "Top-tier corporations would really benefit if there was a greater awareness from the administration, so Schmidt needs to get a better sense from the security community of what the threat landscape looks like day to day."
"This Google situation seems like a fortuitous catalyst that Schmidt can use to de-conflict the different computing capabilities we have in our different agencies," said Greg Garcia, who served in the Bush administration as the Homeland Security Department's assistant secretary for cybersecurity and telecommunications. "We need to see a faster response to system exploits and to hold industries accountable to secure themselves." Garcia said Schmidt's tech background in government and with companies like Microsoft makes him the best candidate to coordinate intelligence-sharing.
The administration was careful in its initial response to the incident. When asked on Jan. 14 about Google's clash with China, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs reiterated Obama's support for a free and uncensored Internet. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke at the Newseum Thursday to announce she was making Internet freedom a diplomatic priority and also discussed new efforts to secure computer networks through domestic and international policy.
"Countries or individuals that engage in cyber attacks should face consequences and international condemnation," Clinton said. "In an Internet-connected world, an attack on one nation's networks can be an attack on all. And by reinforcing that message, we can create norms of behavior among states and encourage respect for the global networked commons."
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