Feds Now Allowed To Use Internet

fast66 writes "Nextgov reports that a new court order allows the Department of the Interior to connect to the Internet, six years after the federal agency was ordered to disconnect. District Judge James Robertson wrote in his ruling, 'I find that the consent order is of no further use and must be vacated.' 'The ... disconnected offices and bureaus may be connected.' He added that his ruling was based not on evidence but 'on a legal conclusion that it is not my role to weigh IT security risks.'"

Comments

Well he's right

[Anonymous Coward]

It is not the job of a judge to weigh that risk.

Re:Well he's right

[frank_adrian314159]

But it is the job of a judge to determine whether or not the agency complied with the earlier ruling telling them to secure their systems. And for those of you who are unfamiliar with this case, the only reason why the DoI was forced off the Internet by the initial ruling was incompetence over a period of many years to secure the data on their system and willful intransigence to do anything about it. And for those of you who want to know what could be so necessary for the DoI to secure, it was the Bureau of Indian Affairs records of payments to tribal members. So, yes, the DoI was leaving personal financial information unsecured.

But s'all good, right? Because judges shouldn't determine risks of unsecured data. In fact, by not doing so, he actually said it's not a judge's job to determine whether or not an earlier ruling was complied with. I hope all of those who agree with the parent comment (and marked it insightful to boot) get this judge when it comes time to determine if its OK that (a) a bank who holds their financial information who in a continually unsecured state, (b) when the bank has been told for years to secure that data and doesn't, (c) when an earlier court has told said bank to stay off the Internet until it secures said information, and then decides that its OK to let the bank off the hook because it's not the court's job to determine the risk of unsecured data.

But, of course, to you right-wing pukes, it's the government, it's a judge, and so it's good that this decision was made to let some dumbass agency back onto the web.

That was silly..

[Creepy Crawler]

Well, a judge should not be making smart calls what governmental policy should be. Silly laws will be paid for by Congress, but I digress.

Is it smart that the US governmental departments can now get online? Not in my opinion. These networks should be segregated from the unwashed internet as there is no data security or guarantees of anything except being hacked. Even the most "uber secure" area can be hacked with varying degrees of effort, either externally or internally. This just opens a vector that was once unopened.

Not smart.

Re:That was silly..

[icebike]

> Even the most "uber secure" area can be hacked
> with varying degrees of effort, either externally
> or internally. This just opens a vector that was
> once unopened.

Excuse me, Did you RTFA?

How is the Bureau of Indian Affairs in need of security in excess of the Defense Department, Congress, the IRS, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission?

I bet you were around here dumping on the Federal Government response to Katrina too! You can't have it both ways.

You can not have efficient and responsive government agencies when you relegate them to 1960s era technology.

Re:That was silly..

[Creepy Crawler]

Who said I want an efficient government???

I want a slow-as-molasses-in-antartica government that will make as few laws as possible. If Congress knows they will only pass 100 bills per year, you'd hope they would check them better.

Now, we have a somewhat eficent government that can and will make laws based on "save the children", "kill pedophiles" or "teh evul terrorists" without any thoughts on how those laws can be used in other, unforeseen ways.

Re:That was silly..

[j79zlr]

I think you are making a very poor assumption that the laws weren't indeed passed explicitly for those "other, unforeseen ways."

Re:No internet connectivity since 2001?

[falcon5768]

Well lets be honest here

1) If their cables where unplugged in the first place, their IT department is made of fail. There is no reason to NOT have a LAN regardless of your internet need.

2) If their IT was worth the scratch they are getting paid, they pulled the updates needed and applied them without the use of autoupdate.

Granted I fear I just missed the joke, but hey its /. that wouldnt be anything new here.