“The report is an important first step towards securing our nation’s cyber infrastructure,” White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters.<\/p>\n
“The administration recognizes the very serious threats public- and private-sector networks face from cyber crime and cyber attack,” he said.<\/p>\n
“Recognizing these threats, the president has elevated cyber security to a major administration priority,” Gibbs added.<\/p>\n
The 60-day review of US cyber security policy was carried out by Melissa Hathaway, a former Bush administration official who has been serving as the interim White House cyber security adviser, and finished last month.<\/p>\n
No single US agency is currently charged with ensuring government cyber security and lawmakers have called for creating a powerful national cyber security advisor reporting directly to the president.<\/p>\n
The Washington Post reported on Tuesday that Obama planned to create a post of “cyber czar” but “discussions were continuing as to what rank and title the adviser would have”.<\/p>\n
The cyber security chief would be a senior White House official with “broad authority to develop strategy to protect the nation’s government-run and private computer networks,” it said.<\/p>\n
Gibbs said the administration was “committed to establishing the proper structure within the government to ensure cyber security issues continue to receive top-level attention and enhanced coordination”.<\/p>\n
Plans to reorganize the US government’s approach to IT security come amid a growing threat of cyber spying and attacks, including reported breaches of the US electricity grid and the F-35 fighter jet program.<\/p>\n
Cyber security was subject to fierce turf battles under the previous administration between the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the super-secret electronic surveillance National Security Agency (NSA).<\/p>\n
A top DHS cyber security official quit in March, complaining that the department had been sidelined and US cyber protection efforts were being dominated by the NSA.<\/p>\n
Two US senators introduced legislation last month proposing the creation of a post of national cyber security advisor.<\/p>\n
Senator Jay Rockefeller, a Democrat from West Virginia, and Senator Olympia Snowe, a Republican from Maine, said the goal of the bill was to reduce US “vulnerability to cyber crime, global cyber espionage, and cyber attacks”.<\/p>\n
“America’s vulnerability to massive cyber crime, global cyber espionage, and cyber attacks has emerged as one of the most urgent national security problems facing our country today”, Snowe said.<\/p>\n
A US congressional panel warned in November that China had developed a sophisticated cyber warfare program and stepped up its capacity to penetrate US computer networks to extract sensitive information.<\/p>\n
“China has an active cyber espionage program,” the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission said in its annual report to Congress. “China is targeting US government and commercial computers”.<\/p>\n
A December report by the Commission on Cybersecurity for the 44th Presidency listed the issue as “among the most serious economic and national security challenges we will face in the 21st century”.<\/p>\n