Soon, computers with immune system like humans to avert cyber-attacks

April 24th, 2011 - 12:08 pm ICT by ANI  

Washington, April 24 (ANI): Computer scientists and IT engineers are planning to build a new technology that would help computers fight viruses just like the human immune system.

This technology would help overcome an ever-increasing number of attacks by cyber-hackers, reports Discovery News.

The scientists hope that in the near future computers will be able to communicate among themselves, recognize threats, and be able to monitor their own health — just like the cells inside our bodies.

“We want the machines to take a more active part in their own protection,” said Bruce McConnell, senior counselor for cyber security at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and co-author of the study.

“We want to use their brains to protect themselves, but always in the context of the policies of the system administrators and owners,” he said.

Some experts are already working on this kind of interoperability on a small scale.

One of the biggest obstacles in getting computers closer to working by themselves is figuring out a better way to authenticate interactions, according to Ross Hartman, vice president for cyber-security services at Science Applications International Corp (SAIC).

“Computers are limited by their programming. If it doesn’t model the known versus the unknown, they can’t tell the self from the other,” said Hartman. (ANI)

Related Stories

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Posted in Health Science |

Subscribe