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NSA Director Says Agency Shares Most, But Not All, Bugs It Finds

Posted by Soulskill on from the you-can-trust-us dept.

Trailrunner7 writes: When the National Security Agency discovers a new vulnerability that looks like it might be of use in penetrating target networks, the agency considers a number of factors, including how popular the affected software is and where it's typically deployed, before deciding whether to share the new bug. The agency shares most of the bugs it finds, NSA Director Mike Rogers said, but not all of them.

Speaking at an event at Stanford University, Rogers said that the NSA has been told by President Barack Obama that the default decision should be to share information on new vulnerabilities "The president has been very specific to us in saying, look, the balance I want you to strike will be largely focused on when you find vulnerabilities, we're going to share them. By orders of magnitude, when we find new vulnerabilities, we share them," Rogers said.

13 of 170 comments (clear)

  1. That sounds nice... by daemonhunter · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That sounds good. Except for one tiny thing:

    I DON'T BELIEVE YOU.

    1. Re:That sounds nice... by meerling · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Exactly. With their culture and policy of black box secrecy and the number of times they've been caught lying both to the public, as well as to their supposed bosses (congress, senate, president) is there anyone left dumb enough to believe anything they say?

  2. Number is irrelevant compared to severity by ibpooks · · Score: 5, Insightful

    By orders of magnitude, when we find new vulnerabilities, we share them

    Number is irrelevant compared to severity, and you can be damn sure they keep the severe ones to themselves.

    1. Re:Number is irrelevant compared to severity by jones_supa · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Exactly. They need only a handful of the most juicy vulnerabilities.

      Besides, that we are having this whole discussion is ridiculous. "Yeah, know a bunch of secrets that we could use to crack into your computer...but we do reveal most of them -- honest!"

    2. Re:Number is irrelevant compared to severity by Charliemopps · · Score: 3, Insightful

      By orders of magnitude, when we find new vulnerabilities, we share them

      Number is irrelevant compared to severity, and you can be damn sure they keep the severe ones to themselves.

      Assuming this wasn't a bold faced lie. Which it more than likely was.
      Assume that this statement was made for some other carefully designed purpose.

  3. To what Standard? by Triklyn · · Score: 3, Insightful

    To what standard do you hold the US government as opposed to other governments? You can be damn sure that every other intelligence agency is doing exactly the same thing... but you're criticizing NSA why exactly?

    My government protects me as I expect your government to protect you. Can't believe I'm going to do this... quoting blacklist quoting orwell, because i've certainly never read the mans essays myself, “Those who abjure violence can only do so by others committing violence on their behalf.”

    I laughed at the Merkel spying thing... as if they didn't expect us to get as much information as possible, and as if we didn't expect them to return the favor. Faux outrage over common practices. IMO. If you don't want your leaders getting spied on... spend more money on your own agencies.

    1. Re:To what Standard? by iceperson · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The US government sitting on knowledge of vulnerabilities is to public safety as not putting out a wet floor sign in the hopes that a terrorist will slip and fall is to crime prevention.

    2. Re:To what Standard? by Triklyn · · Score: 4, Insightful

      In that yes, if a vulnerability does not afford strategic value internationally, yeah, release it if it'll increase public security. But i'm inclined to believe we'd all agree that there's a cost benefit going on.

      If it lets you spy on the iranians... or you know, cause their centrifuges to spin themselves apart. I don't want my intelligence agencies to release that vulnerability until they've spun those fuckers down.

      It's really not in the NSA's job description to be exposing vulnerabilities in public systems so much as exploiting them. We don't have an agency whose job description touches cyber security.

    3. Re:To what Standard? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      To what standard do you hold the US government as opposed to other governments?

      The standard it proclaims for itself about being a beacon of freedom oh and that whole "Land of the free. Home of the brave" stuff.

      You can be damn sure that every other intelligence agency is doing exactly the same thing... but you're criticizing NSA why exactly?

      Because the US holds itself up as being morally superior to others? Because its Head of State is proclaimed to be the "Leader of the Free World" in hilariously Orwellian doublespeak.

      My government protects me as I expect your government to protect you.

      Dictatorships always proclaim this. That they only do what they do for the "good of the people".

      I laughed at the Merkel spying thing... as if they didn't expect us to get as much information as possible, and as if we didn't expect them to return the favor.

      Will you continue laughing when your allies no longer want to come to your aid because you treat them no differently than enemies?

    4. Re:To what Standard? by Triklyn · · Score: 1, Insightful

      meh, i'm not particularly troubled by that, i'm more worried about google knowing everything about me... or facebook. something inherently dirtier about having my information sold for profit... and the whole profit motive strongly implying the spread of such information widely. My government will do a lot of things... but it won't sells what it finds out about me. It'll just sit on it.

    5. Re:To what Standard? by JohnFen · · Score: 3, Insightful

      To what standard do you hold the US government as opposed to other governments? You can be damn sure that every other intelligence agency is doing exactly the same thing... but you're criticizing NSA why exactly?

      For two reasons: The NSA is part of my own government, and the other governments aren't, and the US government is in a position to cause me a lot more harm than other governments are. That other nations may be doing the same thing is irrelevant to the issue at hand. We cannot set our standards of freedom and liberty based on the global lowest common denominator.

  4. NSAs impossible mission by MobyDisk · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The NSA has a dual mission of information assurance–protecting American networks–and signals intelligence–gathering electronic data on foreign networks.

    Unfortunately for them, both American networks and foreign networks use the same software. So their mission is "make sure nobody can get in that safe, including you" and also "break into that safe." This is a no win situation.

  5. That sounds nice... by Shirgall · · Score: 3, Insightful

    They only report the bugs they find, not the ones they create.