Dennis Blair, Director of National Intelligence

Retired Adm. Dennis Blair, director of National Intelligence, said in his confirmation hearings that existing laws governing the conduct of intelligence agencies are “currently slow and degrade the conduct of operations in the field.”

Last month, he released a letter to the intelligence community assuring it of his continued support, attempting to put politically charged issues like enhanced interrogation techniques “into perspective.”

As a retired naval officer whose first deployment began in 1968 on the USS Tattnall during the Vietnam War, he says he understands the challenges they face in a largely hostile public environment:

“As a young Navy officer during the Vietnam years, I experienced public scorn for those of us who served in the Armed Forces during an unpopular war. Challenging and debating the wisdom and policies linked to wars and warfighting is important and legitimate; however, disrespect for those who serve honorably within legal guidelines is not.”

Amid political questions concerning the NSA’s expanded role in protecting the integrity of critical networks, Blair defended the integrity of U.S. intelligence personnel, saying, “I remember well the pain of those of us who served our country even when the policies we were carrying out were unpopular or could be second-guessed.”

In his confirmation hearings, Blair indicated that he favored increased cooperation between intelligence agencies and the military, stating, “There is often not a bright line between these operations,” a position that seems to align with the proposed creation of a “Fifth Domain” cybersecurity command.

Blair closed his letter saying, “There will almost certainly be more media articles about the actions of intelligence agencies in the past, and as we do our vital work of protecting the country, we will make mistakes that will also be reported. What we must do is make it absolutely clear to the American people that our ethos is to act legally, in as transparent a manner as we can, and in a way that they would be proud of if we could tell them the full story.”

LTG Keith Alexander

Lt. Gen. Keith B. Alexander might not be a household name… yet.  He currently serves as head of the NSA and the Joint Functional Component Command  for Network Warfare  at Ft. Meade, Md., but his name has been floated as a possible head of the proposed Cyber Command, which would also be based at Ft. Meade.

A graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, he holds a Master of Science in both Systems Technology and Physics from the Naval Postgraduate School, a Master of Science in Business Administration from Boston University’s Graduate School of Management and a Master of Science in National Security Strategy from the National Devense University.

He is a highly decorated officer, whose awards include a Bronze Star, five Legions of Merit, five Meritorious Service Medals, the Defense Distinguished Service Medal, Defense Superior Service Medal, the Air Medal, the Army Commendation Medal, and two Army Achievement Medals, as well as various campaign and unit awards.

Alexander has served in a variety of capacities, from the G-2 officer for the 1st Armored Division during Desert Shield/Desert Storm as well as in Germany, and a variety of field and intelligence staff positions throughout his career.

The proposed Fifth Domain defense command would coordinate and standardize the fractious efforts of military departments, government agencies, and private contractors to protect the integrity of vital infrastructure networks as well as sensitive government and military data from infiltration.

Some of the challenges facing the agency is to protect against side-channel infiltration as well as brute-force attacks against the top-secret-level Advanced Encryption Standard.  The current cryptological consensus is that the AES is theoretically sound because the code has only been broken through side-channel attacks, an attack using data garnered from the physical application of the cryptosystem, i.e. monitoring the power usage of a key system or how long it takes to encode or transfer a particular piece of data, or brute-force infiltration, using a supercomputer to try every possible permutation of a code system until one fits.

As stated in a report by the Gartner Group earlier this month, the government must meet the challenge of increasingly innovative hackers head-on by improving both hardware and software security standards, a goal that Alexander is well-qualified to work toward.