The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration survived last weekend's Slammer worm attack with only one administrative server compromised, and the agency that controls commercial air traffic in the United States is taking a multipronged approach to network security, said Daniel Mehan, assistant administrator for information services and chief information officer at the FAA.

Mehan, speaking to the media at the ComNet Conference and Expo Tuesday, said no "mission-critical" computers were compromised by the Slammer attack, which shut down Internet service in some parts of Asia and slowed connections worldwide. A combination of keeping up-to-date with patches, keeping workers trained, and using a variety of anti-hacking strategies kept the FAA's important computer systems running during the Slammer attack, he added.

But Mehan is not gloating, because he knows more cyberattacks will come. "In no way do we taunt or challenge people to have another run at us," he quickly added. "We were quite successful in dealing with this worm, but there's always the next one."

[ Read more ]

Related items

• Article: MS SQL Worm Roundup (25 January 2003)