Secret weapons

High-tech advances keep crack code team in security vanguard

The National Security Agency puts a secure telephone in every senior U.S. official's office around the world.

By David Ensor
CNN National Security Correspondent

FORT MEADE, Maryland (CNN) -- At its headquarters outside Washington, the National Security Agency creates codes and secure communications systems for the U.S. government from the president on down.

The NSA puts a secure telephone in every senior U.S. official's office -- all over the world. Speaking on a secured line results in a slightly delayed, compressed signal but with a clear voice. Anyone trying to tap into the line would hear garbage.

"They hear noise. It's random information being sent, and it's unintelligible," said Jon Rolf, an NSA engineer.

But when it comes to protecting government computer systems, the NSA's communications guardians have their work cut out for them. Many are not secure from hackers, who could be U.S. teen-agers or agents from other nations trying to steal national security secrets.

"We see hundreds of probes -- perhaps thousands on a daily basis. So it's a constant game, if you will, of moving as quickly as your potential adversary, staying current on the technologies that are necessary to maintain the security and integrity of the networks," said Michael Jacobs, the NSA's director of information assurance.

A fingerprint scanner may take the place of a password for logging on to a computer.

Passwords of the future

At the NSA's biometrics lab, scientists test the next generation of security tools to keep unauthorized people out of computers and top-secret areas. Use of fingerprints, iris scans and facial recognition is likely to replace passwords as a way to get into NSA computer systems that access top-secret information.

The NSA is testing systems that can match a person to a fingerprint without ever using a user name and that can go through 2,000 fingerprints in less than a half-second. The latest version is so small it can fit on a card that attaches to a laptop computer.

"I have four fingers enrolled so if I actually have a bandage on one finger, you can go to an alternate finger to gain access or you could require two fingers to gain access for the added security," said Bob Rahikka, the NSA's lead researcher on fingerprint scanning.

Iris recognition is also a possibility as the human iris is a unique identifier for each person. NSA engineer Bob Kirchner said the agency's systems scan an image of the iris, convert it into a template and compare it against a stored template in a database.

"Iris has some very unique advantages," he said. "One, we believe it is more accurate than fingerprints. Two, it has the flexibility of not having to contact the sensor or surface like fingerprints."

One benefit of an iris recognition system for computers is that no direct contact is necessary. Even workers in full biohazard gear, for example, can use it.

Facial identification may be the wave of the future for places such as the NSA, which already is testing systems that are keyed to recognize people by face.

A silicon rubber model, similar to one used in the 1996 movie "Mission: Impossible," also doesn't fool the system. Dave Murley, the NSA's biometrics technical director, had an exact physical reproduction of his face made, but the system rejected the mask. "That's good news because we wouldn't like people to be able to use a model like this to get into our system," Murley said.

The system is also keyed to recognize Rahikka, who has a twin brother named Doug, also an NSA employee. When Doug tries to pose as Bob Rahikka, the system rejects him, but scientists said this system still isn't good enough. It has problems, for example, with new mustaches, long bangs or a new nose ring. The researchers are testing another version that captures a three-dimensional image of a person's face and coloring.

Code-crunching supercomputers

The NSA has long been one of the most highly technological agencies in the federal government, and a building at NSA headquarters contains the world's largest collection of supercomputers in one place. A Cray Triton supercomputer used by the agency can handle 64 billion instructions per second. Machines such as the Cray are used for making as well as breaking codes.

Though spies have given some U.S. secret codes to adversaries like the former Soviet Union, NSA officials said they know of no critical American code system that has ever been broken.

The NSA already is testing face recognition systems for future use.

"That said, if it were happening, you can be sure it would be one of the most closely guarded secrets of any government," Jacobs said.

The NSA's headquarters also includes an anechoic chamber -- a massive cathedral of fire retardant plastic foam spikes -- where scientists test signals from transmitters and antennae of every kind. Even as the agency works to make sure that U.S. signals cannot be decoded, it never stops trying to gather and decipher the signals of others.

The NSA also recently released a prototype of a security-enhanced version of the Linux computer operating system as a part of its mission to assure that the United States has secure computer systems.

Linux is a version of the Unix operating system, which is used to run many of the server computers that operate the Internet. Linux, created by Finnish programmer Linux Torvalds in the early 1990s, is an open-source operating system, meaning its source code is open to all, unlike a proprietary operating system such as Microsoft's Windows.

"Open-source software plays an increasingly important role in federal information technology systems. I'm delighted the NSA's security experts are making this valuable contribution to the open-source community," said Jeffery Hunker, senior director for critical infrastructure at the National Security Council, when the announcement was made in January.

The NSA's version is aimed at strengthening the operating system's security and preventing unauthorized users from gaining access to government computers. The NSA released its version under the same general public license as most other versions of Linux in hopes of attracting more development from computer programmers who work on open-source software.

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