Category Archives: NSA

WHATS HAPPENING IN 2021!!

NSA 2021 Leadership Meeting January 20th , 2021, 9:00 am to 1:00 pm EST

Procurement, Operations, Safety, Allied Committee Spring Meetings March 17th, 2021, 9:00 am to 1:00 pm EST

Marketing, Technical, Environmental Committee Spring Meetings March 22nd, 2021, 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm EST

Procurement, Operations, Safety, Allied Committee Summer Meetings June 2nd, 2021, 9:00 am to 1:00 pm EST

Marketing, Technical, Environmental Committee Summer Meetings June 16th, 2021, 9:00 am to 1:00 pm EST

NSA 2021 Annual Meeting August 29th-September 1st Gaylord Palms FL

CONGRATULATIONS MELLOTT!!

The NSA would like to congratulate Mellott Companies on their 100-year anniversary as an organization. Mellott Company has helped redefine the industry through their crushing experience, equipment service and machining capabilities, vast inventory of parts and equipment, reputation as a quality supplier, systems engineering work, and so much more. The NSA looks forward to the continued long term fruitful collaboration with Mellott and wish them success as they embark on another 100 years journey as an aggregate industry leader. Please join us in celebrating with Mellott company and all its employees past and present on achieving this significant milestone.

A MESSAGE FROM THE SAFETY COMMITEE

An Open Letter to NSA Members on the COVID Vaccine

COVID-19 Vaccine Facts

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National Slag Association | For more info call: +610-857 ...

Overall market sentiment has been down on National Storage Affiliates Trust (NSA) stock lately. NSA receives a Bearish rating from InvestorsObserver's Stock Sentiment Indicator.

Sentiment uses short term technical analysis to gauge whether a stock is desired by investors. As a technical indicator, it focuses on recent trends as opposed to the long term health of the underlying company. Updates for the company such as a earnings release can move the stock away from current trends.

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InvestorsObserver's Sentiment Indicator factors in both price changes and variations in volume. An increase in volume usually means a current trend is stengthening, while a drop in volume tends to signal a reversal to the ongoing trend.

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National Storage Affiliates Trust (NSA) stock is trading at $43.70 as of 1:23 PM on Thursday, May 13, an increase of $1.01, or 2.37% from the previous closing price of $42.69. The stock has traded between $42.52 and $43.97 so far today. Volume today is 715,047 compared to average volume of 613,117.

To screen for more stocks like National Storage Affiliates Trust click here.

National Storage Affiliates Trust Trust is a real estate investment trust. The company owns, operates, and acquires self-storage properties located within the metropolitan statistical areas throughout the United States. It owned a diversified portfolio of more than 270 self-storage properties, located in more than 10 states, comprising approximately 15.0 million rentable square feet, configured in approximately 120,000 storage units. National Storage's portfolio consists of self-storage properties designed to offer convenient, affordable, and secure storage units.

Click Here to get the full Stock Score Report on National Storage Affiliates Trust (NSA) Stock.

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Do Traders Think National Storage Affiliates Trust (NSA) Can Turn Around Thursday? - InvestorsObserver

The US Defense Department and third-party military contractors are being advised to strengthen the security of their operational technology (OT) in the wake of security breaches, such as the SolarWinds supply chain attack.

The guidance comes from the NSA, which this week has issued a cybersecurity advisory entitled Stop Malicious Cyber Activity Against Connected Operational Technology

In its advisory, the NSA describes how organisations should evaluate the risks against OT such as Industrial Control Systems (ICS), Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) and Distributed Control Systems (DCS) and make changes to realistically monitor and detect malicious activity.

According to the NSA, if the pros and cons of connecting OT networks and control systems to traditional IT networks and the public internet are not properly reassessed, there is a danger that organisations will be placing themselves in indefensible levels of risk.

Just how serious are the risks if OT hardware such as valves and pressure sensors within industrial operations are impacted by a malicious hacker?

Well, the NSA doesnt mince its words:

The risks could involve many aspects, including:

a. Loss of process control.

b. Failure of safety systems/equipment to operate as designed.

c. Loss of revenue from process interruptions or shutdowns.

d. Loss of human life should safety systems/equipment not operate appropriately.

And this is the reason why the authorities are calling on operators to acknowledge that standalone OT systems that are not connected to enterprise IT systems and the outside world are safer from outside threats no matter how secure the outside connections are thought to be.

Of course, having such systems entirely unconnected on a permanent basis brings its own challenges, and so the NSA acknowledges that an intermittently connected OT system can be a good compromise because it is only at risk when it is connected, which should only be done when required, such as for downloading updates or during times when remote access is required for a finite period of time.

The NSA is right in pointing out that every time an isolated OT system and IT systems connect there is a rise in the risk level, due to the increased attack surface. So careful judgment calls need to be made about what the most important IT-OT connections are, and to ensure that they are hardened as much as possible to fend off potential attacks.

Where IT-OT connectivity is deemed essential, the NSA recommends organisations ensure that all connections are fully managed, and that all access attempts are authenticated, actively monitored, and logged.

Properly understanding the risks associated with connecting critical IT and OT systems and putting measures in place to protect them, should lead to an improved cybersecurity posture and reduce the chance that a potentially highly-damaging or deadly attack will succeed.

More details on what steps OT administrators should take to protect their systems can be found in the NSAs advisory.

Editors Note:The opinions expressed in this guest author article are solely those of the contributor, and do not necessarily reflect those of Tripwire, Inc

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NSA: Connecting OT to the net can lead to "indefensible levels of risk"The State of - tripwire.com

This year marks the 25thAnniversary for the National Cryptologic Foundation (NCF), formerly known as the National Cryptologic Museum Foundation. In celebration of this silver jubilee, the National Security Agency (NSA) is announcing a commitment to strengthen our partnership with the NCF with a focus on increasing educational and public engagement opportunities centered on cybersecurity.

This NSA-NCF joint initiative deepens a quarter century of cooperation, and forms a bridge linking public and private sector experts on national security and cybersecurity, enabling them to collaborate on issues of national security importance.

With a key emphasis on cryptology and cybersecurity, the NSA-NCF partnership is committed to a three-fold strategy:

Educate

Stimulate

Commemorate

As the NCF celebrates its 25th anniversary throughout 2021, NSA looks forward to participating in future joint NSA-NCF educational and public engagement activities focused on cybersecurity.

Read more at NSA

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NSA Congratulates the NCF on their 25th Anniversary and Announces Partnership Homeland Security Today - HSToday

A logo sign outside of a Colonial Pipeline Company facility in Baltimore, Maryland.

Tripplaar Kristoffer | SIPA | AP

The Colonial Pipeline ransomware attack which hit critical national energy infrastructure may represent a new level of ransomware, but there is one aspect to the vulnerability exposed in U.S. defenses that is a reminder of what experts already knew: the federal government and private enterprise have struggled for decades to build a deeper relationship on cybersecurity to stay ahead of accelerating, and more advanced threats.

The scale, novelty and aggressiveness of last year's SolarWinds attack involving reported nation-state actors from Russia, which made its way through both business and government systems, combined with the new hit on critical oil and gas infrastructure using ransomware, heightens attention on a long sought goal of greater government-industry cooperation on cybersecurity.

President Biden came into office post-SolarWinds with plans to increase the level of information sharing between companies and the government on hacking incidents and system weaknesses. The Biden administration has proposed a plan to work with critical infrastructure industries to pilot a new early warning system, a plan that industry groups have supported as a way to test new information sharing and hacking readiness protocols.

Congress is constantly looking at legislative fixes as well.

"We've been discussing the need for more disclosure for many, many years," Democratic New York Congresswoman Yvette Clarke, Chair of the Homeland Cybersecurity, Infrastructure Protection and Innovation Subcommittee of the House Committee on Homeland Security, said at a CNBC Technology Executive Council event earlier this year. She said incentivizing industry to share more information earlier, and more often, is key. "We cannot keep our critical infrastructure vulnerable," she said.

Starting to build a new, improved working relationship at the level of the critical infrastructure makes the most sense to many experts since government has a century of history with these sectors. And it will only become more important as new infrastructure spending advances and the U.S. government and industry invest more in technology like the 5G broadband rollout nationally.

"Virtual adoption in the U.S. has been so rapid out of necessity that more vulnerabilities will get baked into the infrastructure," Clarke told tech executives at the CNBC TEC event which was held in response to the SolarWinds hack.

The Colonial Pipeline hack raises a different set of issues, including government and industry debate over whether to pay the ransom demanded by hackers, but it is similar to SolarWinds in putting the U.S. on the defensive in the cyber realm at the level of national security.

The pipeline is a critical part of U.S. petroleum infrastructure, spanning more than 5,500 miles and carrying roughly half of the East Coast's fuel supply, as well as fuel for airports in Atlanta and Baltimore. The pipeline's owner plans to restore full service by the end of this week, and a partial restart already is underway.

Phil Quade, a former NSA official who is now chief information security officer at Fortinet and head of its federal and critical infrastructure business, said ransomware exploits have recently taken a more disturbing turn, increasingly being used to disrupt essential government services, such as emergency response and health care. The use of ransomware as a means to assert strategic influence and threaten the reliability of critical infrastructures elevates ransomware to a matter of national importance.

The Biden administration's focus on strengthening the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and identifying critical infrastructure has encouraged cyber executives, especially as the types of critical infrastructure increase in form. "It's not just power grids," said Dan Schiappa, chief product officer at cybersecurity firm Sophos. Recent Covid vaccine hacks are another example.

"We need early warning in the critical infrastructure base before others," Schiappa said. But he said there will never be perfect software. "Making mistakes is a 100% certainty ... Disclosure is just a slippery slope."

There is a fine line between the carrot-and-stick involved in government responses to hacking and cooperation with industry.Companies fear releasing too much information too soon, and liability they may be left exposed to without adequate legal protections. Angry hearings on Capitol Hill have not helped to inspire confidence in the balance being more on the carrot than stick side of the relationship.

The biggest disincentive for companies is reputational risk. We need in some way to assure people it won't be leaked, won't be given for a criminal investigation and won't end up in front of a congressional committee.

Jim Lewis, Center for Strategic and International Studies

"Capitol Hill can be the stage for lots of posturing and if you disclose an incident, ideally you get liability protection," Quade said. "If you were reckless you shouldn't get it, but if you had reasonable eyes and understanding, that should not lead to public shaming, and that happens on Capitol Hill."

Concerns about damage to personal and company reputation can lead business leaders to err on the side of keeping close control on information.

"The biggest disincentive for companies is reputational risk," said Jim Lewis, director of the Strategic Technologies Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "We need in some way to assure people it won't be leaked, won't be given for a criminal investigation and won't end up in front of a congressional committee." And he added, "It doesn't seem like it should be so hard to do."

In fact, there are elements of a deeper working relationship on cyber framed by existing government-industry cooperation. The federal government and private enterprise have rules covering confidentiality for banking information and health information, and safe harbor for critical industries, indicating it is possible to design a system with tight controls that could satisfy both.

There are other factors at play beyond being raked over the coals by Congress, according to experts.

It remains unclear how the government would step up to offer much in return to a company or industry being more proactive and transparent in this area. There also is risk of a loss of control in making decisions once incidents or vulnerabilities are disclosed, which is a key consideration for a corporation with customers, stakeholders and shareholders.

"The government could tie yours hands about a response. There is a fear of losing autonomy," said Ariel Levite, nonresident cyber policy fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Government and industry have been engaged in a dialogue for well over a decade on increased information sharing in cyber security and that leaves Quade concerned about too much talk and not enough action. "We don't want to say the same old things. We need more public-private sharing and to expect a different result," he told CNBC in a recent interview that took place before the Colonial Pipeline attack.

Starting with heavily regulated sectors already subject to more stringent government oversight is the preferred approach among many experts to gain experience that can be applied to the broader economy. "We have pieces laying around, but we haven't cracked it," Lewis said. "If we don't, we have a big problem."

A world of increasing capabilities among hackers funded by nation-state rivals, and massive spending in the U.S. on the internet of things and 5G, means that advanced sentinels, such data sensors, will be everywhere. "That could be wonderful opportunity or a massively invasive scourge on the economy," Quade said.

The latest hack occurred as the Biden administrationworks to pass a $2.3 trillion infrastructure planwhich includes funds to address critical infrastructure vulnerabilities.

Quade worked on information sharing and automated detection systems while at the NSA, and he said sharing information once a hack occurs is important, but detecting and mitigating cyber incursions in a relevant time frame are where we need to head in terms of two-way cooperation. "What are some of things we can do to prevent it from happening in the first place, or deal with it in a cyber-relevant time. That's my frustration. I don't want to just dust off some new argument for information sharing," Quade said.

The relationship needs to change because the world has changed in important ways: the U.S. government, while formidable in its cyber capabilities, no longer has a clear advantage over nation-state and criminal adversaries. "The U.S. was always on top," Levite said. "If it didn't have a monopoly, it had a clear dominance, and in the balance between being more vulnerable or advantageous to reap benefits of intruding into systems, the U.S. was well ahead."

That is no longer the case, with Russia and China aggressive in cyber attacks and Iran and North Korea more than pulling their weight. And at the same time, private companies are in many cases now as innovative as the NSA in their cyber capabilities, and the first to know when a system, including government, has been breached, which changes the balance in the relationship.

On Monday, President Biden said in a White House briefing, "So far there is no evidence from our intelligence people that Russia is involved although there is evidence that the actor's ransomware is in Russia, they have some responsibility to deal with this."

"Unfortunately, these sorts of attacks are becoming more frequent. They're here to stay. And we have to work in partnership with businesses to secure networks to defend ourselves," Commerce SecretaryGina Marie Raimondotold the CBS Sunday program "Face the Nation."

Elena Kvochko, chief trust officer at SAP, and part of a group of technology officials which recently created a plan for government cooperation and operational readiness in cyber, said government and industry need to get better at vulnerability management, and in particular what is seen in real time and prevented, rather than six months after an attack.

"This is not a new debate," Kvochko said. "But it is back on top of the agenda at a government and corporate level and we all need to understand the priority of it. We recognize there is a lot of work to do. We all put so much effort and focus into securing our ecosystems, but we can only do it together."

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Colonial Pipeline cyber attack and the high stakes for Biden, business world relationship - CNBC

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Netherlands, The Consumer Price Index nsa (YoY) remains unchanged at 1.9% in April - FXStreet

MCLEAN, Va., May 11, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Onclave Networks, a global cybersecurity leader specializing in securing OT/IoT devices and systems, views the adoption of Zero Trust guidelines as essential for protecting critical infrastructure.

"Attackers are more sophisticated than ever," said Don Stroberg, CEO of Onclave. "Operational technology is too complex and diverse to protect with a passive approach or a continued reliance on IT security solutions. It also means a near-infinite number of attack vectors to exploit. Our platform is purpose-built to secure OT/IoT systems and is based on Zero Trust principles. Our solution greatly reduces the number of potential attack surfaces, and is the ideal choice for mitigating the risk of breaches to OT/IoT networks."

Critical infrastructure and healthcare facilities are particularly vulnerable targets. Power plants, refineries, and hospitals can have tens of thousands of non-IT devices as an example. A complex network of devices means a potentially innumerable number of vulnerable endpoints that can be exploited, increasing the risk and cost when it comes to ensuring the protection and integrity of the network.

Onclave recommends that businesses across industries should adopt a Zero Trustframework: the idea that trust is verified at each endpoint before access is granted to any device, system or user. "This is the core principle of the Onclave TrustedPlatform. Our unique solution continuously reassesses trust to ensure the integrity of your network," Stroberg said.

According to industry data:

*Interpol reports "an alarming rate of cyberattacks aimed at major corporations, governments, and critical infrastructure."

*Ransomware attacks are up 800%.

The National Security Agency (NSA) recently released the Cybersecurity Advisory, "Stop Malicious Cyber Activity Against Connected Operational Technology", for National Security System (NSS), Department of Defense (DoD), and Defense Industrial Base (DIB) operational technology (OT) owners and operators. In the memo, the NSA stated, "While there are very real needs for connectivity and automating processes, operational technologies and control systems are inherently at risk when connected to enterprise IT systems. Seriously consider the risk, benefits, and cost before connecting (or continuing to connect) enterprise IT and OT networks."

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) recently published its Zero Trust Architecture (SP 800 - 207) for organizations to adopt the Zero Trust principles. It requires strong authentication and continuous monitoring for any anomalous behavior before access is given. This includes visibility as well as controlled communications between remote users, devices, applications, workloads, data centers and public cloud environments.

Onclavealigns with both NIST and NSA recommended guidelines. The Onclave TrustedPlatform creates cryptographically separate OT networks while still allowing them to share the IT infrastructure. Onclave also supports Zero Trust principles by moving away from "trust, then verify" to "never trust, verify first", providing continuous monitoring and offering the capability to isolate and contain threats. "We are pioneers in developing a proven solution that immediately protects trusted OT/IoT systems and devices - significantly improving your enterprise's overall network security and making it most resilient," Stroberg said.

About Onclave Networks, Inc.

Based intheWashington, D.C., area, Onclave Networks, Inc. is aglobal cybersecurity leader that specializes in securing operational technology (OT/IoT) through private networks. Onclave provides the first true, secure communications platform based on the Zero Trust framework. Our solution protects both legacy and new operational technologies from cyberattacks and other unauthorized access. Onclave makes trusted secure communications a standardfor all by providing the fastest path to a more secure, simplified, andcost-effective alternative to today's solutions. For more information, contact info@onclavenetworks.comor visit onclavenetworks.com.

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Preventing Cyberattacks and the Risk of Data Breaches to Critical Infrastructure - Inside NoVA

Almost two years since a Government of Ghana car vanished at the premises of a hotel in Kumasi, Police and authorities seem to have no clue.

The brand-new 2018 Toyota Hilux Pickup was allegedly stolen, a couple of months after it was acquired.

Angel FMs Saddick Adams tracks back events surrounding the loss of the vehicle and what we know so far.

Bankrupt NSA Has No Car

The National Sports Authority, the body mandated to regulated Sports in the country, has for some years, gone bankrupt. The body has been at the receiving end of several law suits.

In February 2017 for instance, had its bank accounts blocked after one of its creditors obtained a court order in bid to retrieve monies owed them over the past four years. The creditor won the suit and the only vehicle for the operations of the office confiscated. The Spokesperson Fredericka Davies-Mensah confirmed to newsmen that, Policemen stormed the premises with a bailiff and had the car taken away.

Top staff of the Authority had to do operational rounds in their private vehicle.In November 2018, the NSA acquired two new Toyota Hilux Pick up cars for the use by the body, costing around GHC310,000.

One of the vehicles was kept in a pool at the Authority while the other was handed over to the Director General of the Authority, Professor Peter Twumasi, who was appointed in December 2018, weeks after the vehicles arrived.

Vehicle Not Registered by GV

Despite a Government of Ghana Directive for all vehicles acquired in the name of GoG to be registered under GV, the two vehicles failed to adhere to the directives for unknown reasons.

The vehicle was registered GX6551-18. According to checks by Saddick Adams, the vehicle was first insured under a third-party agreement.

Disappearance of Vehicle and Drivers Narration

On September 5, 2019, the National Sports Authority Director was chauffeured to Kumasi by a driver of the NSA, by name Michael Andoh.

According to the driver, he had dropped the NSA Director at his residence near KNUST and proceeded to lodge at OWASS Hotel, some few kilometers from the KNUST Campus.

Mr Andoh narrated that, upon reaching the hotel, he was called by the aide to the NSA boss to drive to one hospital in the Ashanti Regional Capital, where a staff of the NSA was on admission.

Andoh, the driver drove in the company of the NSA Directors aide to see the ailing staff. They both returned to the Hotel around 7pm. He parked the car at the hotels premises and accompanied the Directors Personal Assistant to the road side where he picked a car.

Andoh then came back to the hotel, inspected the car and went into his room to sleep.

Between 3-4am on the dawn of 6th September 2019, Andoh says he heard loud knocks on his door only to open and meet the security man of the hotel. The NSA driver claim he was told by the security man that, the Directors Personal Aide had been calling for several times and he Andoh was not picking.

He then checked his phone to see several missed calls from the PA.

He called back and was told by the PA that, the Director General had ordered for the two to go back to the hospital again to transfer the ailing staff since his condition had deteriorated.

Andoh says he was hesitant, since he knew it was impossible to get a doctor to transfer a patient at that time of the night and even if they were successful, the patient would have to be transported via an ambulance and not the NSA pickup.

He however picked his keys and dressed up to go pick the car since the order was from his boss. He got down to the car par and lo and behold, the car had vanished without any breakages or traces of damage.

The security officer at the hotel claimed he inspected the compound around 2am and the vehicle was intact, but here, it had disappeared in less than an hour without the security man getting any hint.

Andoh called his boss to report the incident and the two made formal complaints at the KNUST Police Stations. The security man at the hotel and Michael Andoh, the driver, were detained for some few hours and released.

The missing vehicle had three original keys, two of which were with the driver of the vehicle. The other key was with the Transport Officer at the National Sports Authority in Accra. The two keys are still with the beleaguered driver till date.

Conflicting Accounts

In a sharp contradiction to the drivers narration, the Director General of the NSA, in an interview with Joy FM reporter Muftawu Nabila said the car was with his driver Michael Andoh and he was robbed.

Our reporters also gathered that, a facility near the Hotel of the incident had CCTV Cameras installed but when the driver with hotel management tried to access it to find out if they could trace the incident, the CCTV did not function that night, Michael claimed.

Drivers Hotel Changed

The driver, Michael Andoh reveals that, he has been driving at the NSA for over 12 years and anytime they travel to Kumasi, he lodges at the Eno Yeboah Hotel near the Kumasi stadium. He parks his car at the stadium for maximum security before he returns to the hotel to pass the night.

According to him, this had always been the practice.

But few months before the vehicle was stolen, his boss, Mr Twumasi instructed that he changes his hotel to sleep closer to him, at the KNUST Hostel, reason for the decision to lodge at this new hotel where the car was stolen.

When our reporters went to the OWASS Hotel in April 2021, the security man at the centre of events, had been relieved of his duties and no longer works at the hotel. His whereabout were not disclosed.The Police had also not invited Andoh, neither had they contacted the security man again, after they were released a day after the car disappeared.

NSA Institutes Internal Investigation

On 10th September 2019, the NSA Director set up a 3-member Committee to assist the investigative bodies and agencies with the following terms and references.

i.Unravel the circumstances that led to the disappearance of the of the vehicle;ii.Liaise with the National Security including the Police in their investigation.iii.Make recommendations to the management.

After few months of the committees investigations, the chairman of the committee was transferred from the head office to the Greater Accra NSA office, which caused delays in their operations.

As at 7th May 2021, before filing this story, the police had yet to submit any report to the Ministry of Sports or NSA.

When our reporters contacted the Director General Professor Twumasi, he indicated that matter was still with the Police and investigations underway.

He however added that, the car has been insured against theft so he is hopeful it would be replaced.

New Car Acquired

The National Sports Authority had to rent a Jeep car to be used by the Director General, at a cost of 500 cedis day for Accra and 800 cedis outside Accra, for nearly six months after the disappearance of the official vehicle.

Recently, the NSA acquired a Land Cruiser Prado to be used by the Director as his official car.

The controversial missing of the car, for almost two years, without any trace, is still a matter causing lot of musings and murmurings within and around the coffers of the debt-ridden NSA.

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Scandal: How a brand-new Toyota Hilux car belonging to NSA vanished at a hotel in Kumasi - GhanaWeb

Sometime in mid-2009 or early 2010 no one really knows for sure a brand new weapon of war burst into the world at the Natanz nuclear research facility in Iran. Unlike the debut of previous paradigm-shattering weapons such as the machine gun, airplane, or atomic bomb, however, this one wasn't accompanied by a lot of noise and destruction. No one was killed or even wounded. But the weapon achieved its objective to temporarily cripple the Iranian nuclear weapon program, by destroying gas centrifuges used for uranium enrichment. Unfortunately, like those previous weapons, this one soon caused unanticipated consequences.

The use of that weapon, a piece of software called Stuxnet widely concluded to have been jointly developed by the United States and Israel, was arguably the first publicly known instance of full-scale cyberwarfare. The attack deployed a software vulnerability or exploit, called a zero-day, buried so deeply in computer code that it remains undetected until someone a team of hackers, a criminal, an intelligence or law enforcement agency activates it. We've all heard of, and perhaps even been victimized by, criminal hacks that may have pilfered our credit card numbers and passwords, or been spammed by suspicious emails that invite us to claim supposed Nigerian fortunes. But zero-days operate on a different level entirely.

"Zero-days offer digital superpowers," New York Times cybersecurity reporter Nicole Perlroth writes in "This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends: The Cyberweapons Arms Race."

"Exploiting a zero-day, hackers can break into any system any company, government agency, or bank that relies on the affected software or hardware and drop a payload to achieve their goal, whether it be espionage, financial theft, or sabotage. There are no patches for zero-days, until they are uncovered. It's a little like having the spare key to a locked building."

Such capabilities, says Perlroth, make zero-days "one of the most coveted tools in a spy or cybercriminal's arsenal."

As with any other highly coveted commodity, a vast covert global market has sprung up to meet the demand for zero-days. Perlroth explains that this invisible digital trade was nurtured and encouraged by the U.S. intelligence community. As former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden's leaked documents revealed, the NSA not only developed its own zero-days and hacking tools, but beginning in the 1990s started to pay out first thousands, then eventually millions of dollars to the world's most skilled hackers to ferret out security holes in widely used software packages, finding backdoors that could be used to overcome increasingly sophisticated security and encryption protections.

The vulnerabilities were cataloged, filed, and gathered into a closely held, superclassified stockpile a digital arsenal that could be used for espionage, surveillance, and actual cyberwarfare, all without any oversight or outside control. Among many other things, the NSA could now easily track anyone's iPhone at will, read their email, access their contacts, even tap into cameras and microphones.

The NSA truly began to exercise its digital superpowers during the post-9/11 war on terrorism. At first, many of the hackers laboring to develop those tools were kept mostly in the dark about how they were being used, but eventually that changed. "In the years following 9/11, the NSA decided to give its top analysts a glimpse into the fruits of their labors," Perlroth explains. "In a secure room at Fort Meade, the officials projected more than a dozen faces onto a bright screen. Each man on the screen, the analysts were told, was dead thanks to their digital exploits."

Snowden's revelations were only part of the story. As the U.S. sought to expand its stockpile to stay ahead of ever-changing technological upgrades and the capabilities of possible adversaries including Russia, China, and Iran, the American grip on the market began to slip away and other players began to get into the game. When Stuxnet inevitably spread from its narrow and carefully chosen Iranian target to work its way across the world's computers via the internet, the potential advantages of zero-days became clear to everyone and were available to any nation, any group, any organization willing to pay. Former NSA hackers set up shop, joining a burgeoning legion of international hackers looking to cash in, not all of them very picky about their clientele.

In effect, Perlroth explains, it has placed us in the midst of a new arms race, an ever-accelerating competition of offense vs. defense, move and countermove, nearly identical to the nuclear arms race of the Cold War. Former NSA director Michael Hayden noted in a 2013 speech at George Washington University that Stuxnet "has a whiff of August, 1945." "Somebody just used a new weapon,'' he continued, "and this weapon will not be put back in the box."

He was alluding to the first use of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, but zero-days have proliferated around the world far easier and faster than nukes. "The internet has no borders," writes Perlroth. "No cyberattack can be confined to one nation's citizens anymore."

As with the atomic bomb, we've developed a weapon to protect ourselves which has now boomeranged back upon us. That's been demonstrated in recent years by high-profile incidents such as Russia's interference with the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Iranian attacks on Las Vegas casinos, North Korea's assault on Sony Pictures, the SolarWinds attack that the U.S. is still yet to recover from, and others that Perlroth details including a hacking attack on former First Lady Michelle Obama, and Russia's outright cyberwarfare campaign against Ukraine's power grid and infrastructure.

"Nations are now investing far more time and money in finding vulnerabilities than the commercial world, and the open-source community, is spending to fix them," writes Perlroth. "Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran are stockpiling their own zero-days and laying their logic bombs. They know our digital topography well; in too many cases, they are already inside."

"The world is on the precipice of a cyber catastrophe," she concludes.

Perlroth has been covering the cybersecurity beat for a long time and clearly knows her subject extremely well, which may be the reason that "This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends" feels long and somewhat meandering. It's a complex story with many players and parts, and she perhaps tries to cover a bit too much ground, to the extent that the book somewhat loses focus along the way. But it's a vitally important topic that requires far more attention and concern, before the U.S. finds itself blindsided when an adversary decides to unleash full-scale cyberwar on us.

Francis Ford Coppola's 1974 film "The Conversation," about a surveillance expert played by Gene Hackman, ends with Hackman's character so consumed with paranoia that he literally tears apart his own apartment searching for a nonexistent listening device. After reading Perlroth's book, I felt a little paranoid myself, eyeing my own laptop and iPhone. (Maybe that's why her author bio notes that she "increasingly prefers life off the grid" in her family's "cabin in the woods.")

This article was originally published on Undark. Read the original article.

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The next frontier of warfare is online - Salon

MORE than two thirds of the UKs sheep farmers responding to a recent survey have experienced an increase in sheep worrying attacks by dogs during the past year.

This troubling statistic is part of a concerning set of findings released by the National Sheep Association (NSA) from its recent farmers survey assessing the incidence and impact of sheep worrying by dog attacks across the UK.

NSA received a record-breaking response for its 2021 survey specifically aimed at farmers who had experienced dog attacks in the past year. The increase in contributions indicates the scale of the serious problem. On average, each respondent to the survey experienced seven cases of sheep worrying during the past year resulting in five sheep injured and two sheep killed per attack. Estimated financial losses through incidents of sheep worrying of up to 50,000 were recorded, with an average across all respondents of 1570. However, most respondents received no or very little compensation.

NSA Chief Executive Phil Stocker says: There is still much work to do to continue the education of the dog owning public to ensure the future safety and welfare of both farmers sheep flocks and pet owners much loved dogs and this needs to come from strengthened countryside use guidelines and stricter legislation.

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National Sheep Association (NSA) survey reveals alarming trend in sheep worrying by dog attacks | News and Star - News & Star