New FBI Director Addresses Cybersecurity Threats at Conference

Editor’s Note: It may not be crystal clear where the Federal Bureau of Investigation stands in credibility these days considering the tensions with the Trump White House related to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian tampering with the 2016 presidential election. But the agency and its new director, Christopher Wray, are going out of their way to get out in front of the clear and present danger posed to U.S. national security from cyber threats.

Wray has not been a very prominent or controversial public figure, so people may not know much about him. He was appointed to head the FBI by President Donald J. Trump after Trump fired James Comey in May 2017. Considering the mostly unqualified partisan hacks hired by Trump to run most of the federal agencies, it might seem suspicious that Wray took the job under the circumstances.

But looking at his background, at least he seems qualified for the job. He’s a graduate of Yale as an undergraduate and Yale Law School, and first worked for the federal government during the tenure of President Bill Clinton in the late 1990s as an assistant U.S. attorney in Georgia before George W. Bush nominated him as an assistant U.S. attorney in charge of the criminal division of the Department of Justice in 2003.

After Bush was reelected in 2004 and the New York Times published a story it had held for a year about widespread spying on U.S. citizens on the domestic front, not just in contact with alleged “terrorists” abroad, Wray joined FBI Director Robert Mueller and Deputy Attorney General James Comey in threatening to resign unless the domestic surveillance program was curtailed. Wray announced that he would resign anyway in March and he left his post in May, 2005 and went into private practice. He may have been recommended to Trump by New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, since he acted as personal attorney for Christie during the Bridgegate scandal.

But he has taken a keen interest in the cybersecurity threat, and recently appeared at a security conference in San Francisco to talk about the issue. The FBI thought enough of it to send out a press release about it, and due to our keen interest in this issue since the Trump government shutdown, we are sharing it with our readers here.

Staff Report –

With cyber threats to the United States and across the globe reaching unprecedented levels, the FBI uses a full spectrum of expertise, technology, and partnerships to root out cyber criminals, FBI Director Christopher Wray said at the annual RSA cybersecurity conference in San Francisco.

“Today’s cyber threat is bigger than any one government agency—frankly, bigger than government itself,” Wray said in an on-stage interview at the conference. “But I think no agency brings the same combination of scope and scale, experience, tools, and relationships that the FBI has.”

From multinational cyber syndicates to foreign intelligence services, hacktivists, and insider threats, Wray explained that the FBI takes a multidisciplinary approach to combating threats.

The Bureau has an elite rapid deployment force and Cyber Action Teams that can respond to incidents anywhere in the world, for example. In addition, the FBI has joined other federal, state and local law enforcement agencies on Cyber Task Forces to coordinate responses, he said. Specially trained cyber agents are also embedded in FBI legal attaché offices in more than 60 countries worldwide.

In addition to law enforcement partnerships, Wray also stressed the importance of public-private partnerships, so “prevention and response can be swift and coordinated.”

“The key is having the private sector start to form relationships with their local field office beforehand,” Wray said.

As the FBI continues to grow its partnerships, the FBI is also developing its workforce’s cyber expertise. Wray spoke about the FBI’s success in recruiting special agents and professional staff over the past year.

“We’re dealing with the most sophisticated, toughest cyber actors in the world,” Wray said in a pitch to recruit agents to the field. “If you want the ability to take on those people, to be on the front lines of that battle, dealing with incredibly cutting-edge technology … you would be in the right place,” he said, to join the FBI.

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