Controversy Over WikiLeaks Highlights Insider Threats

At the center of the WikiLeaks controversy is U.S. Army Private First Class

Bradley Manning, the man suspected of having passed

the whistle-blower Website a massive collection of U.S.

embassy cables.

Manning has been in military custody for the past several months with

charges of transferring classified information to his personal

computer and passing it on to an unauthorized source hanging over his head. But

it was not monitoring software that exposed Manning; in fact it was an

informant, former hacker Adrian Lamo, who Manning allegedly bragged to via

instant message.

The situation underscores the problems surrounding access controls and

malicious insiders, and it has prompted the U.S. Office of Management and

Budget (OMB) to issue a

memorandum (PDF)to the heads of the country’s executive departments

and agencies requiring them to review “the agency’s configuration of

classified government systems to ensure that users do not have broader access

than is necessary to do their jobs effectively, as well as implementation of

restrictions on usage of, and removable media capabilities from, classified

government computer networks.”

In a chat log between Lamo and Manning published by

Wired magazine, Manning reportedly wrote that he would come in with a CD

labeled “with something like ‘Lady Gaga’ … erase the music … then write a

compressed split file.”

For more, read the eWeek article: .