There may be no country on the planet more vulnerable to a massive cyberattack than the United States, where financial, transportation, telecommunications and even military operations are now deeply dependent on data networking.
What's worse: U.S. security officials say the country's cyberdefenses are not up to the challenge. In part, it's due to a severe shortage of computer security specialists and engineers with the skills and knowledge necessary to do battle against would-be adversaries. The protection of U.S. computer systems essentially requires an army of cyberwarriors, but the recruitment of that force is suffering.
"We don't have sufficiently bright people moving into this field to support those national security objectives as we move forward in time," says James Gosler, a veteran cybersecurity specialist who has worked at the CIA, the National Security Agency and the Energy Department.
If U.S. cyberdefenses are to be improved, more people like Gosler will be needed on the front lines. Gosler, 58, works at the Energy Department's Sandia National Laboratory in Albuquerque, N.M., where he focuses on ways to counter efforts to penetrate U.S. data networks. It's an ever-increasing challenge.
"You can have vulnerabilities in the fundamentals of the technology, you can have vulnerabilities introduced based on how that technology is implemented, and you can have vulnerabilities introduced through the artificial applications that are built on that fundamental technology," Gosler says. "It takes a very skilled person to operate at that level, and we don't have enough of them."
NPR.org Cyberwarrior Shortage Threatens U.S. Security
Guess the government doesnt pay a lot