National cyber security initiative

After years of silence on the issue of cyber security Washington's recent flurry of activity is quite astounding and far reaching. The state of affairs has gone literally from silence to the proposition that government become America's firewall.

How is this to be done? Who is going to do it? How will it be monitored? These questions currently are not clearly addressed or fall under the umbrella label of secrecy.

"A chief concern is that virtually everything about the initiative is highly classified, and most of the information that is not classified is categorized as `For Official Use Only.' These restrictions preclude public education, awareness, and debate about the policy and legal issues, real or imagined, that the initiative poses in the areas of privacy and civil liberties. Without such debate and awareness in such important and sensitive areas, it is likely that the initiative will make slow or modest progress. ... "

"The committee also shares the view of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence that major elements of the cyber initiative request should be scaled back because policy and legal reviews are not complete, and because the technology is not mature. ..."

"The committee also concludes that some major elements of the cyber initiative are not solely or even primarily intended to support the cyber security mission. Instead, it would be more accurate to say that some of the projects support foreign intelligence collection and analysis generally rather than the cyber security mission particularly. ... That is not to say that the proposed projects are not worthwhile, but rather that what will be achieved for the more than $17.0 billion planned by the administration to secure the government's networks is less than what might be expected."

From: Senate Armed Services Committee, Report 110-335, National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2009

Canada tightens controls on resitricted chemicals

This one almost slipped under the radar ...

The Government of Canada is taking action to better control the sale of chemicals that can be used to make explosives.

The Honourable Gary Lunn, Minister of Natural Resources, and the Honourable Stockwell Day, Minister of Public Safety, have announced that new regulations for these chemicals, known as explosives precursors, will be implemented under the Explosives Act.

The new regulations will require that anyone who sells ammonium nitrate or any of the eight other chemicals be registered with the Explosives Regulatory Division of Natural Resources Canada (NRCan) and comply with security measures for storage, record keeping and customer identification.

"Our government believes that new controls on explosives precursors are necessary to reduce the risk of terrorist acts," said Minister Day. "This list of chemicals was drawn up on the basis of expert scientific and security analyses and includes chemicals that pose the greatest risk, and therefore, require regulatory control."

The nine chemicals to be controlled under the new regulations currently have a wide range of legitimate uses, such as ammonium nitrate, which is commonly used in agriculture as fertilizer. The chemicals are: ammonium nitrate; nitric acid; nitromethane; hydrogen peroxide; potassium nitrate; sodium nitrate; potassium chlorate; sodium chlorate; and potassium perchlorate.

Source: NRCAN Press Release

Good news for the Canadian Forces

Rumours have been flying around since at least the Fall. Is the Chief of Defence Staff going to resign? Is General Rick Hillier just too popular, too honest, too straightforward for the Tory government?

Certainly no CDS is recent memory has been asked to do so much. As The General, Rick Hillier must successfully lead Canadian Forces in their first war effort since Korea. Politicos want someone to put a good face forward to voters. Soldiers want someone who genuinely cares. So far Hillier has succeeded beyond expectation on all counts. If anything this has made the politicians nervous. He will tell people the truth as he sees it.

Sitting in the background are two officers who could replace the "Big Cod". On one hand there is Air Force Commander Lt.-Gen. Angus Watt. On the other the Army's Lt.-General Andrew Leslie. Both are sharp although Leslie was "born" for the job and has had more media experience.

When the time comes you can be sure neither of these men would want to be seen as gaining their position because General Hillier resigned before he was ready. Those boots are already going to be pretty hard to fill.

Based on a recent interview with the National Post, Hillier would appear to be around for a while. For many this was a Christmas wish.

Sources: As cited.
Further reading: David Pugliese
Photo: D.N.D