Government Explores VPNs For Protecting Critical Services From DDoS

Senior government officials are studying the feasibility of dividing the next-generation Internet into a series of virtual private networks that could insulate critical national services, such as those provided by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the finance industry, from hackers . . . Senior government officials are studying the feasibility of dividing the next-generation Internet into a series of virtual private networks that could insulate critical national services, such as those provided by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the finance industry, from hackers and distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks.

Richard Clarke, national coordinator for security, infrastructure protection, and counterterrorism under both the Clinton and Bush administrations, raised the issue Tuesday at an invitation-only conference on Internet security sponsored by the Arlington, Va.-based Information Technology Association of America.

According to Clarke, the increasing menace of DDoS attacks, as well as the reliance on the Internet by critical national services -- including the electric power industry, the Defense Department, emergency services, and others -- raises the question of whether the only way to ensure future reliability is to separate tho

The link for this article located at InfoWorld is no longer available.