A late-term change in the Clinton administration's approach to prosecuting cybercrime has made it much more difficult for NASA to track and prosecute hackers who attempt to penetrate its computer networks, a NASA network-protection office official said Monday. "NASA lost 90 . . .
A late-term change in the Clinton administration's approach to prosecuting cybercrime has made it much more difficult for NASA to track and prosecute hackers who attempt to penetrate its computer networks, a NASA network-protection office official said Monday. "NASA lost 90 percent of its ability to track and pursue [suspected computer] intruders because of changes in policy" by the Justice Department, said Stephen Nesbitt, director of operations in the computer-crimes division of NASA's network and advanced technologies protection office.

According to Nesbitt, over the last year-and-a-half, the Justice Department's Computer Crime and Intellectual Property section began prohibiting federal agencies from electronically monitoring the actions of hackers who break into their systems. Under federal wiretapping statutes, system administrators of private computer networks may do such monitoring, but law enforcement officials are normally prohibited from doing so without a warrant.

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