Dozens of computers at the Homeland Security Department have been compromised by hackers. The information taken was sent to a Web service which connects to Chinese Internet sites.
Worse yet, contractors gave misleading information to the department about the attacks,having known about them for months, according to Rep Bernie Thompson D-Miss. Thompson chairs the Homeland Security committee and has called for the department’s inspector general to launch an investigation. "The department is the victim not only of cyber attacks initiated by foreign entities, but of incompetent and possibly illegal activity by the contractor charged with maintaining security on its networks," Thompson wrote in a Sept. 21 letter to the department’s inspector general.
Thompson feels the Unisys Corp which holds the $1.7 BILLION contract to build parts of the network should be held accountable and investigated. Unisys knew of the attacks for months before divulging the information. When questioned, Unisys spokesman had no comment on the allegations, and obviously no explanation as to why they did not sound the alarm when they first knew the information was being stolen. He merely assured us that he was aware of malicious attempts on the United States and took security very seriously. He strangely then started talking about the new round of bids coming up for this plum position in which past performance plays a part. I doubt he’ll have to worry about it, though he does seem to think Unisys is in the running.
As our British friends say, we should all feel "safe as houses" when our Homeland Security information is not even secure. Then again, perhaps Thompson is jumping to conclusions and Unisys has merely contracted the work out to China – doesn’t everyone? IBM has contracted what would seem to be very important government projects to China. The $1.7 Billion would stretch a lot further if Unisys could just contract out some of the more expensive and tedious bits. Of course, I’m making light of what is a serious situation. If Homeland Security isn’t "safe" who is?