US Government Expects Major Cyber Attack

Pam Benson
CNN – Security Clearance 

 

The United States will soon suffer a catastrophic cyberattack if it doesn’t act now to prevent it, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee warned Thursday.

“The clock is ticking and winding down,” Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Michigan, said at a hearing on the security threats facing the United States.

Speaking to the nation’s top intelligence officials, Rogers said that,

“given classified briefings that we’ve had, discussions with all of you and your counterparts … that a cyberattack is on its way. We will suffer a catastrophic cyberattack.”

The committee’s top Democrat, Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger of Maryland, said foreign governments – in particular China and Russia – steal American intellectual property to gain a competitive edge.

Director of National Intelligence James Clapper accused China of:

“the greatest pillaging of wealth in history, if you tote up the value of the intellectual property that has been stolen.”

The urgency and severity of the problem was also echoed by FBI Director Robert Mueller. “The cyberthreat will equal or surpass the threat from counterterrorism in the foreseeable future,” he said.

Both Rogers and Ruppersberger said now is the time for Congress to act and pass cybersecurity legislation.

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