Shane Harris
Recently by Shane Harris
Nov 19 2009, 7:00AM
Why the U.S. Won't Pull a Brazil--Yet
When "60 Minutes" reported that computer hackers had shut off the lights in some Brazilian cities, it raised the obvious question of who was behind the alleged attack. The answers aren't clear, but it is clear that many countries are developing the capabilities to attack their adversaries in cyberspace and to do massive damage to critical infrastructures like the electrical grid. The United States already has those capabilities.
In the current issue of National Journal, I tell the story of how the National Security Agency and the U.S. military in Iraq were able to use cyber attacks to penetrate the communications networks of insurgents and foreign fighters. It was a surgical strike, aimed at a discrete target. But it raises an obvious question: Would the United States ever use a more devastating weapon, perhaps shutting off the lights in an adversary nation? The answer is, almost certainly no, not unless America were attacked first.
In the current issue of National Journal, I tell the story of how the National Security Agency and the U.S. military in Iraq were able to use cyber attacks to penetrate the communications networks of insurgents and foreign fighters. It was a surgical strike, aimed at a discrete target. But it raises an obvious question: Would the United States ever use a more devastating weapon, perhaps shutting off the lights in an adversary nation? The answer is, almost certainly no, not unless America were attacked first.
Nov 10 2009, 2:22PM
Brazil To "60 Minutes": It Wasn't A Hacker
Brazilian officials are disputing the claim by "60 Minutes" and others that a blackout in 2007 was caused by computer hackers. Wired magazine's blog Threat Level, citing government and investigative sources, reports that the outage "was actually the result of a utility company's negligent maintenance of high voltage insulators on two transmission lines." Insulators hang from power lines and are prone to collect debris, which can cause power surges. In this case, officials say soot from nearby fires collected on the insulators.
Nov 9 2009, 2:18PM
Cyber Security Goes Prime Time
Last night's 60 Minutes piece on cyber security ("Sabotaging the System") led with the story that blackouts in Brazil in 2005 and 2007 were caused by computer hackers who took over the systems that control electrical generation facilities. This wasn't a revelation. A senior Defense Department official noted the Brazil attack in a barely noticed speech two years ago, and Wired magazine's "Threat Level" blog recently picked up the trail. Nor was the 60 Minutes story, six months in the making, full of major scoops.
Sep 30 2009, 9:05AM
The Lessons of Leaks
In the fall of 2004, as President George W. Bush and Sen. John Kerry entered the home stretch of the presidential campaign, portions of a bleak intelligence estimate about the future of Iraq were leaked to reporters. Among the most alarming findings was the possibility that sectarian violence and political incompetence in Iraq's fledgling governmental institutions could ignite a civil war. Bush had seen this report months earlier, but in his public remarks, he didn't ratchet down his sunny optimism about Iraq's future. Did intelligence analysts privy to the Iraq report's contents decide to leak them in order to embarrass the president and trip up his reelection bid?
The president thought so. A former senior intelligence official who spoke regularly with the president told me Bush became convinced that a left-wing contingent of CIA employees had given the embarrassing information to reporters. Bush also thought that this fit a pattern of information control emanating from Langley. Earlier the same year, The New York Times and The Washington Post had run the first stories about the CIA's covert program of detaining and interrogating certain "high-value terrorists." A former CIA official, who was directly involved in the program, told me that alarm bells went off at headquarters. The information contained in the news reports was so specific--and accurate--that senior officials presumed the leak must have come from within the agency's Counterterrorist Center, which was managing the program day-to-day, or the larger operations directorate, of which the CTC was a part. At the time John Helgerson, the inspector general, had just wrapped up a lengthy report about the program, which quoted CIA officers who were convinced that the agency's activities would be exposed by the media.
The president thought so. A former senior intelligence official who spoke regularly with the president told me Bush became convinced that a left-wing contingent of CIA employees had given the embarrassing information to reporters. Bush also thought that this fit a pattern of information control emanating from Langley. Earlier the same year, The New York Times and The Washington Post had run the first stories about the CIA's covert program of detaining and interrogating certain "high-value terrorists." A former CIA official, who was directly involved in the program, told me that alarm bells went off at headquarters. The information contained in the news reports was so specific--and accurate--that senior officials presumed the leak must have come from within the agency's Counterterrorist Center, which was managing the program day-to-day, or the larger operations directorate, of which the CTC was a part. At the time John Helgerson, the inspector general, had just wrapped up a lengthy report about the program, which quoted CIA officers who were convinced that the agency's activities would be exposed by the media.
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