DARPA looks for ways to shield drones from viruses
To defend the nation's unmanned aerial vehicles and other military networks from cyberattacks, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is seeking assistance from regular citizens.
Among the speakers at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Colloquium on Future Directions in Cyber Security Nov. 7 in Arlington, Va., was one of the agency’s top researchers Kathleen Fisher, who is bent on ending cyberattacks and network infiltration of the U.S. military’s unmanned aerial vehicles, reports Spencer Ackerman of Wired’s Danger Room blog.
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Still, Fisher admitted she isn’t quite sure how to proceed in shielding the drones’ hardware and software components from viruses, and asked for the input of those in attendance at the colloquium, the blog said.
And Fisher isn’t the only DARPA program manager in the midst of figuring out how to protect the military’s networks; in fact, Howard Shrobe, in his Clean-Slate Design of Resilient, Adaptive, Secure Hosts (CRASH) program, is researching how the human immune system’s defenses might provide the answer.
The agency also highlighted its newest initiative, Crowd Sourced Formal Verification, led by researcher Drew Dean, which would enlist the help of citizens to defend the military’s internal infrastructure in a video game-like format.