Washington, July 11 (ANI): The United States Government should recruit master hackers to launch cyber-attacks against Islamist terrorists and other foes, a leading defence analyst and government adviser has said.
John Arquilla, a professor of defence analysis at the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California, believes instead of prosecuting elite computer hackers, Washington should use their skills to detect and track enemies.
"The brilliance of hacking experts could be put to use on behalf of the U.S. in the same way as German rocket scientists were enlisted after the second world war," The Guardian quoted Arquilla, as saying.
He said the U.S. had fallen behind in the cyber race and needed to set up a "new Bletchley Park" of computer whizzes and codecrackers to detect, track and disrupt enemy networks.
"If this was being done, the war on terror would be over," he added.
Arquilla, who invented the term cyber warfare two decades ago, said a few master hackers had already been recruited but more was needed.
"Let's just say that in some places you find guys with body piercings and non-regulation haircuts. But most of these sorts of guys can't be vetted in the traditional way. We need a new institutional culture that allows us to reach out to them," he said.
Arquilla lambasted lengthy jail terms for hacking, saying it "poisoned" relations between both sides. He also disagreed with the attempt to extradite Gary McKinnon, a British system administrator who has been accused by one US prosecutor of the "biggest military hack of all time" using the code name Solo.
""It's very, very troubling and ridiculous. They're trying to use deterrences that won't work."
Arquilla, who advised General Norman Schwarzkopf during the first Gulf War and Former Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld during the second Gulf War, estimated there were around 100 master hackers in the world, with many, if not most, in Asia and Russia. (ANI)
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