U.S. military rebooting ISIL

The U.S. military has established a special cyberwar task force at U.S. Cyber Command in Fort Meade, Md., to carry out cyberattacks against ISIS in Syria and Iraq, after disappointment at the ineffectual character of initial efforts, reports said Friday.

The U.S. military has established a special cyberwar task force at U.S. Cyber Command in Fort Meade, Md., to carry out cyberattacks against ISIS in Syria and Iraq after disappointment over initial cyber efforts, reports said Friday.

The approximately 100-person strong task force, codenamed Ares, is headed by the commander of the U.S. Army’s cyberwar efforts, Lt. Gen. Edward Cardon, the Washington Post reported.

Citing anonymous defense officials, the paper says Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter was ‘unhappy with the effectiveness of the early efforts against the Islamic State, leading to the creation of the dedicated unit led by Cardon.’

The U.S. cyber campaign against ISIS is the first publicly declared military operation online by any nation, the paper notes. It does not mention the various undeclared cyber campaigns that have been run to support Russian military operations, such as in Georgia in 2008.

The Post reports it isn’t part of the task force’s mission to choose individual ISIS leaders to be targeted in airstrikes.

‘Cyberattacks occurring under the new task force might, for instance, disrupt a payment system, identify a communications platform used by Islamic State members and knock it out, or bring down Dabiq, the Islamic State’s online magazine,’ the Post said.

One key objective of the group is to more closely align the work of U.S. cyberwar specialists at Fort Meade with U.S. Central Command, headquartered in Tampa, Florida, which is in charge of the conventional military campaign.

Closer cooperation would help commanders, for instance, by enabling them the chance to achieve a military objective, such as crippling a communications network, by digital, rather than explosive means — potentially reducing the risk of civilian casualties.

Trump postpones executive order focused on AI security 

Under a draft executive order, the NSA, Treasury Department and other federal agencies would get 90-days to test new models for cybersecurity and national security concerns.

U.S. robotics companies want federal help to keep Chinese robots out of America’s networks

Stryker attack highlights nebulous nature of Iranian cyber activity amid joint U.S.-Israel conflict

Government

• FBI officials say AI is bolstering adversaries, emphasizing need to focus on cyber basics, patching

• Feds accuse China of ‘systematic’ distillation of U.S. AI models

• CIA’s Michael Ellis says cyber intelligence is changing how the agency operates

• The G7 tells industry to hurry up and prep for post-quantum encryption

Technology

• European parliament members call for slowdown of Serbia’s EU entry over spyware use

• FCC proposes public scorecard to rate telecoms on anti-robocall efforts

• Pegasus, NoviSpy variant spyware found on devices of Serbian activists

• Wyden seeks upgraded NSA security guidance on commercial VPN use

Threats

• Chinese espionage groups swarm to exploit triple-link chain of zero-days

• Microsoft discloses two actively exploited zero-days among 974 vulnerabilities

• Russian national extradited to US for alleged involvement in bank-account takeover scheme

• Attackers exploit zero-days in consistently besieged SonicWall product

Policy

• Whistleblower says USPS deploying new, ‘untested’ IT systems governing mail-in ballots

• ‘Watershed 250’ test program in Texas looks to private sector for water cybersecurity help

• Former sexual abuse victims say Grok used their images, videos to train deepfake capabilities

• Cyber threats nudge Trump to sign executive order on foreign equipment in U.S. energy infrastructure