The CIA is storing sensitive data on an Amazon cloud?

2015-02-27T17:13:53-05:00

Apparently, the AWS GovCloud has just come online. Designed to serve 17 (mostly unnamed) U.S. intelligence agencies, the cloud is described as “an isolated AWS Region designed to allow U.S. government agencies and customers to move sensitive workloads into the cloud….”

Bearing in mind how many legal and moral headaches came along with hiring civilian contractors to perform "security services" in combat theaters, who else thinks that using corporations to store (and potentially analyze) our intelligence data is a recipe for disaster?

Full article at http://www.enterprisetech.com/2015/02/26/spy-agency-adding-capabilities-to-its-aws-cloud/

Spy Agency Adding Capabilities to its AWS Cloud

The CIA is preparing to rollout a classified version of an Amazon Web Services (AWS) marketplace to support the U.S. intelligence apparatus as it puts the

Response by CW5 Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 27 at 2015 6:33 PM

2015-02-27T18:33:14-05:00

I gotta believe this cloud is going to be secure, MAJ Private RallyPoint Member. At least I would hope so. I imagine it being another "drive" on a secure system, and it would probably be transparent to the user that it's in the cloud. There are always security concerns, but I trust our computer security experts to secure our data ... as best as they can. The insider threat will be there, whether the information is stored in the cloud, on a server, or on a hard drive.

It's going to take a MAJOR shift for the CIA to transition from “information hoarding to information sharing." I cannot imagine the CIA (of all agencies) will ever put its information anywhere it's at risk.

Response by MSgt Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 27 at 2015 7:00 PM

2015-02-27T19:00:03-05:00

Been using unclass version for months now, check out the white papers. It is a legit service, having cleared civilian contractors is no more a risk than granting clearances to junior troops out of high school, maybe even less of a risk.

Response by 1LT Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 27 at 2015 7:00 PM

2015-02-27T19:00:36-05:00

MAJ Private RallyPoint Member. The AWS Government Cloud does not even begin to meet requirements for handling classified military and/or classified intelligence data of any kind. The AWS Cloud is strictly limited to storage and retrieval of Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI). It cannot provide adequate physical security / logical controls for classified information.

Warmest Regards, Sandy

Response by SPC Angel Guma made Feb 27 at 2015 8:00 PM

2015-02-27T20:00:10-05:00

On Amazon? Hmmm....

Response by SGT Jim Z. made Feb 28 at 2015 9:15 AM

2015-02-28T09:15:31-05:00

Amazon won the DoD cloud initiative last year I believe to host applications and data. DISA believes it will be a cost savings but with significant upfront costs to each service. My organization which hosts many warfighter applications did a cost analysis and realized even we do it a 1/3 cheaper than DISA would do it after the upfront costs. Guess what we will maintain our own applications until something changes. I agree that it will have some encryption around it but what type I do not know. I can also think the CIA may not put real important data out there but more of the declassified open source stuff that they are asked for regularly. Of course this is only an assumption.

Response by CPT Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 28 at 2015 9:27 AM

2015-02-28T09:27:32-05:00

Listen, I work on a military system that is constantly under attack for NOT using "best of breed" software that is commercially available. But the truth is we *DO*!!! But then look at this reaction.

Guess what? We are running Microsoft Office on Dell computers. We use Blackberries. And on and on and on. We cannot create every single thing we use in house. This may seem obvious, but there is not a difference between these things and what you are complaining about.

I think the bigger issue here is the Cloud Computing concept. People are afraid of it. I have been around long enough to remember how scared people were about Shared Drives. Believe it or not, there were outcries about security concerns (and data loss issues) for e-mail, voice mail, heck, computers in general. And at first, there were problems/issues, but imagine if we had shut it all down because of the nay sayers.

Response by LTC Yinon Weiss made Feb 28 at 2015 2:35 PM

2015-02-28T14:35:48-05:00

Corporations build the government's rifles, tanks, computers, radios, buildings, phones, airplanes, and just about everything else. They make the hard drives that all data is stored on, and the software to manage it. The government does not have the internal capability to build much of anything... Companies are the only ones with the knowledge and expertise to do these things, under government oversight.

Response by 1SG Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 28 at 2015 5:29 PM

2015-02-28T17:29:38-05:00

Since there are 17 US Intelligence agencies in the US Intelligence Community, it was probably assumed that they didn't have to be named.

Central Intelligence Agency
National Security Agency (DoD)
Defense Intelligence Agency (DoD)
National Geospacial Intelligence Agency (DoD)
National Reconnaissance Office (DoD)
Air Force ISR Agency (DoD)
Army Intelligence and Security Command (DoD)
Marine Corps Intelligence Activity (DoD)
Office of Naval Intelligence (DoD)
FBI National Security Branch (DoJ)
DEA (DoJ)
Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence (DoT)
Bureau of Intelligence and Research (DoS)
Office of Intelligence and Analysis(DHS)
Coast Guard Intelligence (DHS)
Homeland Security Investigations (DHS)
Office of Intelligence and Counter Intelligence (DoE)

Response by CPT Zachary Brooks made Mar 2 at 2015 12:04 PM

2015-03-02T12:04:14-05:00

Well if even Anonymous gave up trying to get in...

http://www.computerworld.com/article/2511711/cybercrime-hacking/anonymous-attack-on-amazon-com-appears-to-fail.html

Anonymous attack on Amazon.com appears to fail

The loosely-knit group of hackers dubbed Anonymous today apparently failed in its effort to launch a DDoS attack on Amazon.com.

Response by CPT Pedro Meza made Jul 22 at 2016 5:35 PM

2016-07-22T17:35:45-04:00

Sounds like something out of Terminators movies, and nothing good will come from it.