The US authorities are more worried about a simultaneous
attack on their banks’ IT systems and a physical attack on the
postal system than any other terrorist threat.
The new US director of national intelligence, Mike McConnell,
told a conference in Washington that the combination of a
successful hacking attempt and contamination of the US postal
service with a substance such as anthrax was a bigger worry than
suicide bombers or nuclear weapons.
McConnell said, “If someone were to have a sophisticated attack
on our financial services systems at the same time as they mailed
the equivalent of anthrax through the US postal service, we would
have major disruption.”
He was speaking at the US Army’s Chemical and Biological Defense
conference.
McConnell is an intelligence and information security specialist
who advised the White House on the security of the US’s most
important IT systems during the 1990s. He replaced John Negroponte
as director of national intelligence on 20 February.
Mike McConnell’s career in national
intelligence
The trade body for
the US defence industry
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