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White House Press Briefing by Dana Perino 9/27/07 (Cyber Security)
— Thursday, September 27, 2007 — Q On another topic? Earlier this year DHS conducted an experiment that showed how vulnerable a government generator was to a cyber attack. Can you tell us who here at the White House was briefed on that, who saw the tape -- who might have been given a tape of that? MS. PERINO: Well, I don't know who all would have seen the tape, but obviously, these are very important issues for the government to address. Malicious cyber attacks are a possibility, and it is only right and proper that the federal government, in conjunction with the private sector, which has a lot of responsibility over many critical pieces of infrastructure across the country, that we work cooperatively, plan for the worst, and expect the worst, and that way we can prevent it from happening. So I don't know who all would have seen it, but obviously, I think it's a good thing that the government is checking into this, making sure that we know what could be possible so that we can all work together and make sure that it doesn't happen. Q Well, what about the funding for this? According to OMB, next fiscal year, the Department of Homeland Security is expected to drop cyber-security spending to less than $100 million, and spending on securing the control systems that control the critical infrastructure is projected to be only $12 million. Why such a small amount of money? MS. PERINO: Well, I think what we need to remember is that the issue of cyber security crosses many different agencies, and they all work cooperatively together. In fact, DHS, Department of Homeland Security, is tasked with making sure that everyone is coordinated across the agencies. The other thing is, since 2004, the budget at that time for overall cyber-security issues was $4 billion. Now it's over $6 billion in the President's '08 request. What you're talking about is a small part of something that DHS does. So it doesn't -- it's not reflective, in terms of the overall budget in terms of cyber security. And what that doesn't include -- and I don't have the number, but I can try to get it for you -- is the research and development monies that are going into funding experiments and things to make sure that we're preventing any sort of attacks. Q So, I mean, you're saying that those figures that I just quoted are not a reflection of where cyber security is in terms of priorities for this administration? MS. PERINO: That's absolutely correct. The priorities should be shown that in the overall, cyber-security budget has gone up by over $2 billion. And we continue to do more coordination and cooperation, not only through the interagency process, to make sure that we're all hooked up and knitted up, but also with our state and local partners, but more importantly, the private sector, which, for example, with electrical grids, a lot of that security is handled by private sector. Labels: Cyber Security, Dana Perino, Department of Homeland Security, Press Briefing, White House Press Corps
Posted by White House Press Corps @ 6:45 PM
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