IP: MSFT and our nuclear arsenal

[David Farber <dave@farber.net>]

>Date: Thu, 12 Jul 2001 19:40:36 -0400
>Subject: MSFT and our nuclear arsenal
>From: Kai Lui <kai@kailui.com>
>To: Dave Farber <dave@farber.net>
>
>An interesting piece from the Washington Post if you haven't already seen
>it. Unfortunately (or fortunately), the specific MSFT software is not
>identified.
>
>Kai Lui
>------------------
>
>Nukes: A Lesson From Russia
>By Bruce G. Blair
>Wednesday, July 11, 2001; Page A19
>
>Although the United States spends nearly $1 billion every year to help
>Russia protect its vast storehouse of nuclear weapons materials from theft
>or sale on the black market, few Americans know how this aid helps
>strengthen America's own nuclear safeguards.
>
>Russian experts at the Kurchatov Institute, the renowned nuclear research
>center in Moscow, recently found what appears to be a critical deficiency in
>the internal U.S. system for keeping track of all bomb-grade nuclear
>materials held by the Energy Department -- enough material for tens of
>thousands of nuclear bombs.
>
>Kurchatov scientists discovered a fatal flaw in the Microsoft software
>donated to them by the Los Alamos National Laboratory. This same software
>has been the backbone of America's nuclear materials control system for
>years. The Russians found that over time, as the computer program is used,
>some files become invisible and inaccessible to the nuclear accountants
>using the system, even though the data still exist in netherworld of the
>database. Any insider who understood the software could exploit this flaw by
>tracking the "disappeared" files and then physically diverting, for a
>profit, the materials themselves.
>
>Full article at:
>
>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A44053-2001Jul10.html



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