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Revamped Proposal Suggests Strategies to Tighten Online Security September 18, 2002 By JOHN SCHWARTZ A long-awaited report from the Bush administration intended to help citizens, businesses and government shore up the nation's cyberdefenses will be revealed today. Sort of. The report, "The National Strategy to Secure Cyberspace," was scheduled to be released today with great fanfare at Stanford University. But officials have decided not to release the report in final form today in hopes of building support among high-tech companies that worked to weaken previous drafts. Instead, the current document is being referred to as a draft. It will be subject to a 60-day comment period, after which it will be revised and submitted to the president for final approval. Like many other reports on cybersecurity before it, the new document describes a society that has grown increasingly dependent on networked computer systems, and thus increasingly vulnerable to cyberterrorists, hackers and destructive computer programs like viruses and worms. Like those previous reports, it also emphasizes the importance of education for business, government and consumers. The report breaks down the cyberspace security challenges faced by various online populations, including home users and small businesses as well as industry sectors and nations. Some of the tougher measures proposed in earlier drafts of the document included recommendations that Internet service providers give high-speed customers firewalls and other tools to defeat hacking and bans on many uses of wireless networks until the technology is made more secure. The draft being released today calls for more general proposals that one security expert dismissed as "pretty-please recommendations" to improve security awareness. Richard A. Clarke, the chairman of the president's critical infrastructure protection board, dismissed assertions that the report had been softened. "That is a vast exaggeration," Mr. Clarke said yesterday in a conference call with reporters. "The point is not what was in Draft 4 or Draft 8 or Draft 12," Mr. Clarke said. The report, he said, is an effort to offer guidance without resorting to a greater regulatory structure, or what he called a "government heavy hand" approach. "Everybody has to do his own thing to protect cyberspace," he said. The report has raised fears among civil liberties advocates that the proposals, in trying to answer many issues, rely heavily on more surveillance of computer networks - and, by extension, of those who use them. "It's hard to find a security approach that will simultaneously solve the problems of ice storms, software glitches, Al Qaeda, faulty operating systems and spam," said Marc Rotenberg, director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington. "But in almost any scenario, less emphasis should be placed on monitoring and more on reliability." Those speaking in favor of the new report said that the industry welcomed the opportunity to comment on the report, and that the essence of it is unchanged. "The basic thrust of the recommendations is still there," said Mario Correa, director of Internet and network security policy for the Business Software Alliance, a lobbying and policy group in Washington. A security expert said he was disappointed that the government was not getting tougher on cyberissues. The expert, Russ Cooper, whose official title of surgeon general describes his role in advocating good computer health and hygiene at the Trusecure Corporation, said the information he had received about the report was "a lot of rhetoric, a lot of discussion, a lot of what we've been doing along - but nothing mandatory about what we needed to do." Mr. Clarke said that those expecting a detailed set of requirements were missing the point. He declined to estimate the ultimate costs of implementing the proposals, saying they should not be taken as a set of low-level, specific requirements. "It's not a plan," he said, "it's a strategy." http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/18/politics/18CYBE.html?ex=1033398425&ei=1&en=f7c7894474e98621 HOW TO ADVERTISE --------------------------------- For information on advertising in e-mail newsletters or other creative advertising opportunities with The New York Times on the Web, please contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] or visit our online media kit at http://www.nytimes.com/adinfo For general information about NYTimes.com, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Copyright 2002 The New York Times Company <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. 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