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NSA Director Says Agency Shares Most, But Not All, Bugs It Finds
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.
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.
That sounds good. Except for one tiny thing:
I DON'T BELIEVE YOU.
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.
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.
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?