Cyber-espionage is defended in the United States
Keith Alexander, general Director of the National Safety Agency (NSA) of USA, said that monitoring programmes that are based on records of calls and data from internet users have avoided “dozens and dozens” of terrorist attacks.
Alexander said, during a hearing of the Senate Appropriations Committee, that the United States intelligence teams are doing things to protect the citizens of possible attacks against their security.
The official, who is also in charge of cyber security in the country, said that the infrastructure of the United States, ranging from telecommunications systems to supplies of water and energy, is not ready to face a destructive computer attack.
“In the scale of 1 to 10, with 10 as greater defense, the lack of preparation of our infrastructure to address a destructive cyber attack is around 3, based on my experience”, said Alexander, during his first public speech since last week, that arose by reports of phone records and internet surveillance, performed by Edward Snowdenan former employee of the CIA, allegedly took refuge in Hong Kong.
Alexander also said that it was vital to have a strong role of the Department of Defense on cyber systems, as they receive increasing threats and their vulnerability would be very serious.
Moreover, Edward Snowden, who was in charge of filtering the surveillance program of communications, said during an exclusive interview with Hong Kong daily, South China Morning Post, that the United States “has spent years spying on China and Hong Kong”.