As predicted, Snowden’s recklessness will make it much more difficult for future leakers to attain documents:
Alexander said the NSA has determined which files Snowden took and said they amounted to a lot of information, though he wouldn’t say how much. “We’re taking action to fix this” so it can’t happen again, said Alexander, who was interviewed on stage at the forum by Pete Williams of NBC News.
The new security measures include restricting the use of removable media, such as thumb drives, by systems administrators to move data among network servers, Alexander said. U.S. officials have said that Snowden used a thumb drive to copy the documents he took.
Alexander outlined other steps, including requiring two people to execute some activities, such as gaining access to server rooms, and speeding programs to encrypt files to make them readable only to authorized users.
Good job, Ed.