US Army Calls Apple to Active Duty

by , 8:55 AM EST, December 21st, 2007

The U.S. Army is looking for ways to shore up its cyber defenses, so it is looking to Apple for some of its computer needs. The military is hoping that by adding Macs to its mix hackers will be less likely to break into critical systems, according to Forbes.

Lieutenant Colonel C.J. Wallington, a division chief in the Army Office of Enterprise Information Systems, claimed that the Macs and Xserves already online in the data center have been holding their own and are fending off attacks. "Those are some of the most attacked computers there are. But the attacks used against them are designed for Windows-based machines, so they shrug them off," he said.

So far, only about 20,000 of the Army's 700,000 computers are Macs, but that number is growing. About 1,000 new Macs are added during each bi-annual hardware buying phase.

The push to start using Macs in the Army began in 2005 when the Army's chief information officer, General Steve Boutelle, called for diversity in the organization's computer vendor options.

Apple will likely see an even stronger presence in the military once its computers are compatible with the security card system the Army relies on. Thursby Software is already working on that, and should have Common Access Cards system-compatible software for the Mac available soon.