The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is boosting efforts to monitor the Internet for cyberterrorist and hacking incidents as the nation readies for war against Iraq.
The U.S. is quietly assembling an Internet-wide monitoring center to detect and respond to attacks on vital information systems and key e-commerce sites.
New computer-monitoring software designed to second-guess the intentions of individual system users could be close to perfect at preventing security breaches, say researchers. [ Direct link to paper, PDF ]
Researchers at the University at Buffalo have developed software that detects cyberattacks while they are in progress by drawing highly personalized profiles of users. The software has proven successful 94 percent of the time in simulated attacks.
The U.S. National Communications System is in the early stages of a Global Early Warning Information System (GEWIS) pilot project which will assess how well critical areas of the Internet are performing worldwide and then use that data to notify government, industry or U.S. allies of impending cyberattacks or possible disturbances.
Richard Clarke, special adviser on cyberspace security to President Bush, said the top priorities for the White House Office of Cyberspace Security include the creation of both an early-warning network for cyberattacks and an analysis center that would help the government target the most vulnerable points in the nation's critical infrastructure.
Researchers are developing a Network Early Warning System (NEWS) prototype capable of providing advance warning of impending Internet- based coordinated attacks on Department of Defense computer networks.