New national cyber adviser to report to Obama
Obama administration releases homeland security agenda that includes plans to create a national cyber adviser position to report directly to the president.
The administration of President Barack Obama will be hiring a new national cyber adviser, according to the agenda for homeland security released on his first full day in office.
The Agenda for Homeland Security, released Wednesday, lists goals for defeating terrorism and improving intelligence gathering, as well as for protecting the nation's information networks and critical infrastructure.
The top item under protecting information networks is to strengthen leadership on cyber security by establishing a "position of national cyber advisor who will report directly to the president and will be responsible for coordinating federal agency efforts and development of national cyber policy."
Other items include: supporting an initiative to develop next-generation secure computers and networking for national security applications, and deploying secure hardware and software to protect critical cyber infrastructure; establishing "tough new standards for cyber security and physical resilience;" developing systems to protect trade secrets from being stolen online from U.S. businesses; shutting down "untraceable Internet payment schemes;" and securing personal data stored on government and private systems and requiring companies to disclose data breaches.
The homeland security agenda also calls for ensuring that "security is considered and built into the design of new infrastructure, so that our critical assets are protected from the start and more resilient to naturally-occurring and deliberate threats throughout their life-cycle."
Also on Wednesday, former Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano was sworn in as secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.