Open Source In the National Interest

Posted by ryuzaki0 on Tuesday July 11, 2006 @04:12AM from the penguins-for-everyone dept.

munchola writes "A new report from the Department of Defense's Advanced Systems and Concepts Office recommends that the DoD move to adopt open source software and methodologies as well as open standards in order to make the most efficient use of internal resources. According to CBR, the report states that a move to 'Open Technology Development' is not only in the U.S. national interest, but in the interests of U.S. national security. OTD incorporates open source methodologies and open standards, but also takes into account the fact that the DoD has systems that it would rather keep secret."

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Re:The anti-OSS people do have one point. by Peter+Mork · 2006-07-11 04:32 · Score: 5, Interesting

The solution for OSS is simple. Any OSS software that goes into a Command and Control system needs to have it's source code audited by an independent authority.

Unfortunately, it's not as simple as auditing the source code. You also need to have complete control over the compiler, as implemented in machine code. For example, see Ken Thompson's comments on how to imbed self-replicating code into a compiler so that every program has a back door.