In response, DHS Undersecretary for Preparedness, George Foresman said his agency is in the final stages of reviewing the credentials of a "very qualified" individual and that the position is likely to be filled "very soon."
"This has been, and remains a top priority" at the DHS, Foresman said during a hearing on cybersecurity for the national infrastructure. The hearing was conducted by the House Commerce Committee Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet.
DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff announced the creation of a new assistant secretary for cybersecurity and telecommunications last October. The move was widely welcomed at that time because it was seen as recognition of the need to elevate the importance of cybersecurity issues within the agency. Before Chertoff's announcement, cybersecurity issues were being handled at a director-level position at the DHS. Since Chertoff's announcement, however, the position has remained vacant.
In his opening statement at the hearing, Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) said that the failure to appoint an assistant secretary "conveys a lack of appreciation" of the nation's cyberthreats by the DHS. Dingell noted that cyberattacks against the critical infrastructure are growing and that any failure to prepare for them could be "devastating." He added that the country shouldn't have to wait for a "massive cyberdisaster" to put plans in place.
Reacting to similar concerns from Rep. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.), Foresman noted that the absence of an assistant secretary had not stopped the DHS from moving forward with response planning. "We have been in overdrive the whole time," he said.
Criticism for the DHS at Wednesday's's hearing was not limited to that one issue, however. David Powner, director of IT management issues at the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) noted that DHS had so far failed to establish a comprehensive plan for responding to cyberthreats against critical infrastructure.
He said that criminal groups, foreign intelligence services and terrorists all have the ability to launch disruptive physical and cyberattacks. While the DHS developed high-level plans for infrastructure protection, components that address Internet recovery are "incomplete", Powner said. In addition, while the DHS has begun working with private industry on processes for jointly responding to cyberattacks, the initiatives are "immature" and lack deadlines for completion, he said.
Also, hampering the department's efforts to establish a recovery plan is a lack of agreement over what the agency's role should be when a disruption does occur and when it should get involved, he said. In addition, the private sector has been reluctant to share information with the DHS because "it doesn't see a value in sharing" and lacks trust in the leadership, Powner said.
Those comments echoed a July GAO report, which said the government is not prepared to effectively coordinate public and private-sector plans for recovering from a major Internet attack. "Until these challenges are addressed, DHS will have difficulty achieving results in its role as a focal point for helping the Internet to recover from a major disruption," the report noted.
Meanwhile, in an unrelated development, the DHS Wednesday released a report highlighting the findings of its Cyber Storm Exercise involving simulated cyberattacks against the nation's critical infrastructure that were conducted in February. Among the key findings in the report is the need for a well-established chain of command in a time of crisis, the importance of information sharing across government and industry sectors and a better ability to correlate incident information across the two groups.
Cyber Storm was conducted by the DHS's National Cyber Security Division on Feb. 6-10. More than 110 public, private and international organizations took part in the exercise, which simulated a cyberattack directed at critical infrastructure.