Mathematician Says Internet Is as Secure as It Will Ever Be

Mathematician Andrew Odlyko has spent his career in telecommunications security.

Last week’s uproar over the Conficker computer virus that was supposed to strike on April first has many computer security experts worried. But not all of them. MPB’s Cari Gervin explains.

Andrew Odlyzko is first and foremost a mathematician. But the professor at the University of Minnesota did spend 20 years at AT&T working in telecommunications security.

Odlyzko studies cryptography and number theory. He was at the University of Mississippi last week discussing the complicated mathematics, which also happen to be the basis for all internet security.

“It’s actually not all that easy to commit good crime on the internet,” he says.

Odlyzkso admits there are plenty of holes in internet security – he likes to say that cyberspace is held together with chewing gum and bailing wire. But he says the foundation is sound.

“The existing infrastructure’s not as insecure as it seems. Consider the fact that in spite of all these outcries about internet insecurities that’s been going on the past two decades, there hasn’t been a single major disaster. In fact, if you look at the big disasters or look at the current financial crisis, it was not the result of hackers breaking into AIG or CitiBank."

Odlysko says the real problem with internet security – well, it won’t ever be solved with math. Computer programmers are human, after all. And as such, Odlysko says, there will always be mistakes in their software and operating systems that criminals can exploit.

For MPB News, I’m Cari Gervin in Oxford.