Feds Now Allowed To Use Internet 113
fast66 writes "Nextgov reports that a new court order allows the Department of the Interior to connect to the Internet, six years after the federal agency was ordered to disconnect. District Judge James Robertson wrote in his ruling, 'I find that the consent order is of no further use and must be vacated.' 'The ... disconnected offices and bureaus may be connected.' He added that his ruling was based not on evidence but 'on a legal conclusion that it is not my role to weigh IT security risks.'"
No internet connectivity since 2001? (Score:5, Interesting)
In all seriousness, I hope that they take some precautionary steps before plugging in the LAN cables...
Re:That was silly.. (Score:3, Interesting)
haha, hack the ICBM com network, I dare you.
Yes, lets not let people have access to their government, lets keep everything paper based and in some dusty book and the bottom of some building where the public can 'access' it.
How many? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:No internet connectivity since 2001? (Score:5, Interesting)
Generally speaking, there's a reason that windows machines come with AV and firewalls these days. I'm sure the most conservative estimates of time-to-pwn would be less than the time it would take to download updates.
Re:The switch has not yet been flipped (Score:4, Interesting)
One of the problems was, apparently, that even if you ignored the sloppy accounting, the non-existent security on their networks basically made any figures coming out of the bureau highly suspect. So the judge ordered the entire network off the Internet so that only local malfeasance would further affect the numbers.
It is further alleged that criminal lobbyist Jack Abramoff had a hand in this mess...
Schwab
Re:That was silly.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Tomorrow's news: (Score:5, Interesting)
Watch out for new torrents of sensible data from the same evening on. But of course, that's just my little hysterical hyperbole, they wouldn't have taken that order by the word, now, would they? They cannot, no, can they?
Re:That was silly.. (Score:5, Interesting)
The BIA is all those things for Native American tribes, each one being Sovereign.
What the BIA used to have was the online equivalent of a safe, with the combination 12345, holding Native Americans' money.
Re:No internet connectivity since 2001? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:How many? (Score:2, Interesting)
I am also a DOI employee, and was stuck at a snowy contamination site in Minnesota when it happenned (November or December 2001). The judge cut off all email, server access, and public web pages, even though very few of the DOI agencies have anything to do with the Indians. We had to petition office by office and prove that we did not have any critical Indian data, and that obviously took a while.
I ended up setting up several free Netscape accounts on the public computer at the Days Inn to email ~50 MB of data (back when that was a lot of data) to our cooperators.
Re:Tomorrow's news: (Score:5, Interesting)
Good, because that's what I did when we first got kicked off. I haven't worked there for a few years so I don't know if they kept it up, but it's not hard to do - and certainly not hard to do in preparation of re-connection.
I guarantee you, the Trust Bureau's probably have networks secure then most military networks. The scrutiny on them from the courts and plantiff's is huge and they know it.
Funny how the person who started the lawsuit also happens to own a bank and wants the trust fund moved to her bank for administration. Funny how that never comes up - it's always just the "evil government". No, there could never be any other ulterior motives here.
Puhleeze....
Re:That was silly.. (Score:1, Interesting)
Government isn't a magical entity that exists in and of itself - there are actually people who make up government agencies. In the case of the BIA, Native American's get higher preferences for hiring then even Veterans - so guess, historically, who 95%+ of the employee's of the BIA have been?
So who screwed who here?
Frankly I think the government should just concede and turn it all over to the tribes, and then wash their hands of it. The trust fund would implode in less then 5 years due to administration costs alone that they currently get for free (never mind graft and mismanagement - they think the BIA did a bad job under the feds? I would love to see how some tribes would squander their shares).
Re:Well he's right (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:and this is important... WHY? (Score:3, Interesting)
http://timesunion.com/AspStories/storyprint.asp?StoryID=668451&normal [timesunion.com]