A House Democrat recently said the U.S. is lacking in efforts to prepare for future cyberattacks, blaming Republicans for focusing on impeaching Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over the crisis at the southern border.
Rep. Glenn Ivey (D-MD) said the threats of cyberattacks on U.S. communications infrastructure are “exactly the types of things that the Homeland Security Committee should have been looking at instead of wasting time on the Mayorkas impeachment.”
The Maryland congressman added that the U.S. is “not doing enough” to prepare for cyberattacks, citing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Nothing to see here.
Just a video from the WEF back in January 2023 highlighting how geopolitical instability is increasing the risk of catastrophic cyberattacks, with a “prediction” of a major event in the near future due to a cybersecurity skills gap. pic.twitter.com/Dfz3rVtt0H
— ZNO 🇺🇸 (@therealZNO) February 22, 2024
“These sorts of vulnerabilities to cyberattacks, I think, are something the United States isn’t doing enough to get prepared for. And when you watch what Russia is doing with respect to Ukraine, you can see those capabilities are increasing, same with respect to China and Iran,” Ivey said.
Ivey said Congress needs to act and stop “wasting time” on investigations and impeachments, adding that there needs to be an evaluation of the threats posed by cyberattacks, which he said are “evolving radically and quickly.”
“We’ve got to make sure that we’re changing and protecting ourselves and moving as quickly as those threats are,” he added.
“And then, the second piece is making sure that the providers out there, some will be commercial, some will be governmental, but they need to make sure that they understand what these threats are and they’re prepared for them and that they’re working together in a coordinated way and that they have the resources to do it,” he added.
Amid the threat of a cyberattack by Russia, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), alongside international allies, recently disrupted a network of more than 1,000 hacked internet routers that the Kremlin’s military intelligence agency used to conduct cyber espionage operations against the U.S. and other Western countries.
The Department of Justice (DOJ) revealed that the Russian hackers used the network of hacked routers, called a botnet, to target U.S. and foreign governments and “military, security and corporate organizations” to gather intelligence.
FBI Director Christopher Wray’s allegations against Russia were met with no response from the country’s embassy in Washington, D.C.
