Much was made recently about malware that made its way onto computers supporting remotely piloted aircraft operators at Creech AFB, Nev. But the issue wasn’t really that serious, according to US Strategic Command Commander Gen. Robert Kehler. The so-called attack actually was a virus that only affected support elements of a ground control station, not any RPAs, Kehler told defense reporters Tuesday in Washington, D.C. The virus “entered ‘from the wild,'” probably in the process of a manual change-out of a hard drive, he said. Protocols restricting thumb drives have been in place for a year, but Kehler said forensics are still under way to uncover how the virus entered the system. Still, the tools in place to detect the virus worked as intended, and no damage was done, he said. “We were able to quarantine the virus fairly quickly,” he noted.
The use of a military counter-drone laser on the southwest border this week—which prompted the Federal Aviation Administration to abruptly close the airspace over El Paso, Texas—will be a “case study” on the complex web of authorities needed to employ such weapons near civilian areas and the consequences of agencies…
