US needs to focus on superior technology: Pentagon

With India and China poised to over take US in the field of training more highly proficient computer scientists, a top US Defence official has said that America must confront the cyber defence challenge with a focus on superior technology and productivity.

"Even as the US government strengthens its cadre of cyber security professionals, it must recognise that long-term trends in human capital do not bode well.

"US has only 4.5 per cent of the world's population, and over the next 20 years, many countries, including China and India, will train more highly proficient computer scientists than will the US," Deputy Secretary of Defence William J Lynn wrote in the latest issue of the Foreign Affairs.

"The United States will lose its advantage in cyberspace if that advantage is predicated on simply amassing trained cyber security professionals. The US government, therefore, must confront the cyber defence challenge as it confronts other military challenges: with a focus not on numbers but on superior technology and productivity," he wrote.

"High-speed sensors, advanced analytics, and automated systems will be needed to buttress the trained cyber security professionals in the US military. And such tools will be available only if the US commercial information technology sector remains the world's leader -- something that will require continuing investments in science, technology, and education at all levels," Lynn said.

The Obama Administration has established a cyber command, which is all set to be fully operational in October.

The Pentagon, he said, has increased the number of its trained cyber security professionals and deepened their training.

Following industry practices, the Pentagon's network administrators are now trained in "ethical hacking," which involves employing adversarial techniques against the US' own systems in order to identify weaknesses before they are exploited by an enemy, he said.

"The Pentagon is therefore working with the Department of Homeland Security and the private sector to look for innovative ways to use the military's cyber defence capabilities to protect the defence industry," Lynn said.