Showing how serious it is about the growing threat of cyber attacks, the U.S. government is spending about $500 million on “cyber technologies” to fight back. A portion of this is set aside for a virtual firing range of sorts to test out what they develop.
This would also allow military personnel to simulate attacks in order to train security personnel to be ready for when an attack actually occurs. The effort is being led by DARPA, which was the defense department division that played a key role in the development of the Internet.
That half billion dollars isn’t just going to this project, but also to developing defensive and also offensive cyberwar technologies. After all, there may be a point when the U.S. government feels it necessary to fight back against attackers.
It shouldn’t be a surprise that our nation’s government is going to these lengths — and spending such a hefty sum of money as well — to protect against cyber attacks. It was just last month that the Pentagon began pushing to consider such intrusions “acts of war.”
That statement has been a subject of derision from hackers, especially LulzSec, who alluded to it after hacking into the U.S. Senate’s web servers. “Is this an act of war, gentlemen?” the group asked in a statement.
The virtual firing range is expected to be operational by the end of this year.
For more tech news and commentary, follow Ed on Twitter at @edoswald and on Facebook as well as Today @ PCWorld.