Inside NSA Red Team Secret Ops With Government’s Top Hackers
When it comes to the U.S. government’s computer security, we in the tech press have a habit of reporting only the bad news—for instance, last year’s hacks into Oak Ridge and Los Alamos National Labs, a break-in to an e-mail server used by Defense Secretary Robert Gates … the list goes on and on. Frankly that’s because the good news is usually a bunch of nonevents: “Hackers deterred by diligent software patching at the Army Corps of Engineers.” Not too exciting.
So, in the world of IT security, it must seem that the villains outnumber the heroes—but there are some good-guy celebrities in the world of cyber security. In my years of reporting on the subject, I’ve often heard the National Security Agency’s red team referred to with a sense of breathless awe by security pros. These guys are purported to be just about the stealthiest, most skilled firewall-crackers in the game. Recently, I called up the secretive government agency and asked if it could offer up a top red teamer for an interview, and, surprisingly, the answer came back, “Yes.”
Source: Popular Mechanics
