06.14.12
More US virus writers needed, too
From Newsday, a syndicated piece warning of the pressing need for more trained computer security workers — to defend the US from cyberwar.
At the heart of it, Jeff Moss of DefCon, who turned the BlackHat convention into a business which sold for millions to another company.
Moss was appointed to Barack Obama’s Homeland Security Advisory Council in 2009.
Jeff Moss, a prominent hacking expert who sits on the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Advisory Council, said that it was difficult to persuade talented people with technical skills to enter the field because it can be a thankless task.
“If you really look at security, it’s like trying to prove a negative. If you do security well, nobody comes and says ‘good job.’ You only get called when things go wrong” …
Moss, who goes by the hacker name Dark Tangent, said that he sees no end to the labor shortage …
U.S. defense contractor Northrop Grumman Corp on Monday launched the first undergraduate honors program in cybersecurity with the University of Maryland to help train more workers for the burgeoning field.
Sean Sullivan, from F-Secure, said: “[Flame is] interesting and complex, but not sleek and stealthy. It could be the work of a military contractor — Northrop Grumman, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and other contractors are developing programs like these for different intelligence services. To call it a cyberweapon says more about Kaspersky’s cold war mentality than anything else. It has to be taken with a grain of salt.???
Not enough science and math majors, it reads. Boo-fucking hoo.
There are plenty of educated scientists in the US, just not precisely the ones these types of stories always pine for. Plus, there’s the private sector unwillingness to train on its own dime.
So if the government will do it for us …