Perfect Citizen: US to set up secret 'Big Brother' surveillance system to monitor internet for cyber-attacks | Mail Online

US to set up secret 'Big Brother' surveillance system to monitor internet for cyber-attacks

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 1:48 PM on 9th July 2010

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The US plans to install a Big Brother-style monitoring system on the computer systems of private companies and government agencies to prevent cyber-attacks from abroad.

The program, named Perfect Citizen, will rely on sensors that will be deployed in networks running critical infrastructure such as the electricity grid and nuclear-power plants.

It will be able to detect any attempt by foreign saboteurs to launch a cyber-attack .

But privacy campaigners have reacted furiously, saying that 'mission creep' will make it easy for security forces to effectively spy on normal citizens.

Inside the control room at a US nuclear power station. US security chiefs fear key infrastructure could be at risk from cyber-attack

U.S. intelligence officials are concerned about Chinese and Russian surveillance of computer systems that control key parts of the U.S. infrastructure.

Today the National Security Agency (NSA) attempted to play down fears that the project will be used to spy on citizens.

The program is 'purely a vulnerabilities-assessment and capabilities-development contract,' Judith Emmel, an NSA spokeswoman.

'This is a research and engineering effort,' she said. 'There is no monitoring activity involved, and no sensors are employed in this endeavour.'

A US military official have dismissed privacy concerns and claim that intrusion into the private lives of citizens is no worse than that from speed cameras.

Perfect Citizen is a 'logical extension' of work employed in the past to protect critical infrastructure from sabotage, he said.

Defence firm Raytheon won a contract for the classified work's initial phase valued at up to $100 million, according to the Wall Street Journal.

'You've got to instrument the network to know what's going on, so you have situational awareness to take action,' a military source told the paper.

'This contract provides a set of technical solutions that help the National Security Agency better understand the threats to national security networks,' Emmel said.

'Any suggestions that there are illegal or invasive domestic activities associated with this contracted effort are simply not true,' Emmel said.

'We strictly adhere to both the spirit and the letter of U.S. laws and regulations.'

Earlier this year Google's email service, GMail, came under attack from Chinese hackers trying to access the accounts of human rights activists in the country.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defence William Lynn said last month that more than 100 intelligence agencies and foreign militaries were actively trying to penetrate U.S. computer systems.

He said that 'weapons-system blueprints are among the documents that have been compromised.'

The United States must be able to operate freely in cyberspace amid dangers of 'remote sabotage,' General Keith Alexander said June 3 in his first public remarks as head of U.S. Cyber Command.

Cyber Command was set up in May to protect U.S. interests in cyberspace.

via dailymail.co.uk

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