All the right reasons
The US is building the Joint Strike Fighter, a fighter jet we're all losing money on. The UK now, partner in the pan-european order of these jets, has told the US that if they don't hand over the source code to the jet's firmware, the deal is off.
Reason ? They think the US might be able to remotely control/disable the jets. I believe this wipes out the old argument about open source software being too vulnerable to be used in military equipment - thing could be the other way round.
Link : http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2152035/joint-strike-fighter
Article by Le Crab (Netherlands) from http://www.the-crab.com/
It's an interesting story, for sure. I happen to work for Canadian defence contractor and have some other thoughts on what this means. More than likely, all this will do is start a spitting match between the US Gov't and the poor sap company who made the software.
http://www.jonwatson.ca/node/726
Posted by: Jon | March 27, 2006 9:40 PM | Permalink to Comment