Federal Computer Week notes that “Defense and industry officials describe DOD networks as the Achilles’ heel of the powerful U.S. military. Securing military networks is even more critical in an increasingly transformed military in which information is as much a weapon as tanks and assault rifles.”
The US DoD operates approximately 3.5 million PCs and 100,000 local-area networks at 1,500 sites in 65 countries, and it runs thousands of applications on 35, major voice, video and data networks. Department officials acknowledged to FCW.com that hackers attacked military networks almost 300 times in 2003, and the DoD tallied almost 75,000 incidents on department networks last year. FCW.com writes:
“Top U.S. military cyberwarriors recently said that adversaries probe DOD computers within minutes of the systems’ coming online… During the past five years, Chinese hackers have successfully probed and penetrated DOD networks. In one intrusion, they used a Trojan horse – a program containing malicious code in an e-mail or adware – to obtain data on a future Army command and control system.
…DOD networks were hacked 294 times in 2003, said retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Harry Raduege during an industry luncheon briefing in December 2004. He is the former commander of the Joint Task Force for Global Network Operations (JTF-GNO), the organization that operates and defends DOD networks…
“The threat is becoming more aggressive and sophisticated,” said Army Brig. Gen. Dennis Via, deputy commander of JTF-GNO.”