Cyber-Security Plan: “Strategery” Part Deux

A couple months ago I wrote a quick blog on President Obama’s initial outline for protecting the nation’s homeland security… well, this past Friday he released his cybersecurity plan to the general public. In all honesty, there aren’t any big surprises and it seems inline with the recommendations put forth by the Center for Strategic and Internal Studies (CSIS) cybersecurity commission released in December.

For the most part, the media and industry pundits find President Obama’s plan to be on-target and favorable. He is determined to have a more joint effort (Public and Private organizations) to “deter, prevent, detect and defend” against cyber attacks. He was clear he does not want the federal government to be able to regularly monitor “private-sector networks” and believes that the Internet has become the backbone of American communications. The plan is to have cybersecurity leadership to be working closely to him in the White House and it appears that the appointed cyber czar will have the coordinating authority over the Pentagon, National Security Agency, Department of Homeland Security and etc.

An interesting observation regarding President Obama’s strategy over the Bush administration is his plan to have his approach distributed to the public and to companies that are most vulnerable to cyber attack. The previous administration’s strategy/policy was entirely classified. Obviously, if it’s important and requires everyone’s help, you need to get everyone on the same page. You can only do it if there is a national plan and everyone knows about it.

Again, President Obama is making cybersecurity is a top priority and has made good on those campaign pledges… Who wouldathunkit, the President makes a promise and keeps it. If only all of our government leaders were like that ;)