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State Department Developing Cyber Toolkit

Posted by samzenpus on from the like-a-thief-in-the-night dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The U.S. State Department, known for its recent RFID passport embarassment, seems to have developed a key tool in the Department of Homeland Security's cyber toolkit for federal agencies. There's not much out there on it other than mention of a tool called SandStorm in a recent press release from State's Bureau of Diplomatic Security. According to the site, "SandStorm simultaneously collects, correlates, and analyzes data on multiple computer systems and departs, leaving no trace of its activities. The White House is championing this cyber tool and the Department of Homeland Security has selected it as a cornerstone application for a cyber toolkit being made available to all Federal agencies." Sounds scary to me, but may be a step in the right direction."

5 of 269 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Definitely Beneficial by markybob · · Score: 5, Insightful

    because this america, not china. our property is supposed to be free from search without a warrant. it has something to do with the constitution...

  2. They that can give up essential by chris_sawtell · · Score: 5, Insightful
    "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

    Ben Franklin wrote those words over 200 years ago.

    They apply today just as much as they did then.

    Somebody needs to remind the current incumbent of the White House about his nation's history.

  3. Re:Definitely Beneficial by Skrekkur · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Do you have any idea what how slim the chances really are to be killed by terrorists in the US? Even after 9/11 it's next to none. You are far more likely to be in a car accident, die of cancer, get a heart attack or being shot by a family member. This terrorist "threat" is no reason to take away our freedoms and slowly install a police state where the citizens are the "threat". Sure we cannot just ignore the threat but I for one prefer a little "unsafer" world over privacy invading security

  4. Re:Serious? by symbolic · · Score: 5, Insightful


    Remember how the existence of Eschelon was denied until some British guy confirmed that it did in fact, exist? Remember the cheesy "agreement" that the US would not be collecting data on its own citizens, but would have every opportunity to access such data from that collected by any of the four other Eschelon participants? There is absolutely no reason to believe that it WON'T be used on U.S.-owned sites. Even worse, there's absolutely nothing that will stop them, if they so choose.

  5. they spout ish like this for wanna be terroists... by xTantrum · · Score: 5, Insightful
    They must...
    According to the site, "SandStorm simultaneously collects, correlates, and analyzes data on multiple computer systems and departs, leaving no trace of its activities
    How the hell can a goverment - who has so much internal bickering and bureacracy going on, can't even co-ordinate an efficient rescue mission after a hurricane on their OWN SOIL, AFTER THEY JUST GOT TAKEN OUT BY TERROISTS and had ample warnings, and implement RFID tags in passports knowing the security risks and exploits available - expects us to believe they can actually take their collective heads out of their ass and deliver on this. C'mon get your shit togather first on the home front, like savings lives, increasing awareness for science education, available cheap broadband..yada, yada, yada - then come talk to me about this. It really comes down to this. I DON'T BELIEVE YOU! see my sig
    --
    $action = empty(PHP) ? backToC() : unset(PHP) ; "when the concrete cases are understood, the abstractions are readily