**LEAD STORY**
**LEAD STORY**
U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director John Deutch warned Congress on Tuesday that the United States faces a growing threat of cyberspace attacks against its computer networks by other nations and terrorist groups. Deutch told a Senate Governmental Affairs hearing, "While the details are classified and cannot be discussed here, we have evidence that a number of countries around the world are developing the doctrine, strategies and tools to conduct information attacks." The director would not name the countries suspected.
Deutch told the senators, "International terrorist groups clearly have the capability to attack the information infrastructure of the United States, even if they use relatively simple means. I am certainly prepared to predict some very large and uncomfortable incidents." He said that intelligence and law enforcement agencies were "fully alerted" to the threat.
The director related how a large-scale attack could disrupt U.S. computer networks that could cripple the banking, business, communications, energy, military and transportation industries in the nation. All of those industries are dependent on computers that could be (and are, in some cases) vulnerable to sabotage from "hackers" to being physically attacked with explosives. With such weapons as computer viruses transmitted through the internet, such cyber-attacks could shut down international commerce and fund transfers, damage computer systems that guide commercial air and/or rail traffic. cut electrical power, or even prevent the Pentagon from issuing orders to its forces in the field.
Deutch added, "Day-to-day operations of U.S. banking, energy distribution, air traffic control, emergency medical services, transportation and many other industries all depend on reliable telecommunications and an increasingly complex network of computers, information databases and computer driven control systems. Virtually any 'bad actor' can acquire the hardware and software needed to attack some of our critical information based infrastructures."
Director Deutch said, "There is a highly classified intelligence estimate that focuses on foreign attacks on the public-switched telephone network system of this country."
One senator asked Deutch how he would compare the threat of computer attack to other threats such as nuclear, chemical and biological, the director answered, "I would say it was very, very close to the top."
The CIA director said that his agency and the U.S. Department of Defense plan to create an Information Warfare Technology Center to handle computer attacks at the National Security Agency (NSA). He said that the U.S. government has been seeking cooperation from commercial computer users, but many have been reluctant to share their information.
Besides planning the computer-attack center, Deutch said that U.S. intelligence agencies, along with the U.S. Justice Department and the FBI were devoting more resources to the problem and were looking for evidence of foreign intent to attack U.S. computer systems. The director said, "One effort looks for foreign sponsorship of U.S.-based computer-hacking activities as well as evidence of organized crime involvement." The inter-agency critical infrastructure security group is scheduled to release a security threat assessment by 1 December 1996.
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