The government was to announce the standards Wednesday to show federal computer engineers how to alter Microsoft's Windows 2000 operating system to make it more secure.

Government experts hope that the benchmarks will solve an embarrassing problem that affects both federal and private computer networks, largely by plugging security holes most hackers already know about.

Technology research firm Gartner estimated recently that through 2005, 90 percent of computer attacks will use known security flaws for which a solution is available.

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