Dan Geer, who works for In-Q-Tel, a venture capital firm serving U.S. intelligence agencies, said on Thursday that the United States government should be more concerned about possible threats to the nation through the Internet.

Even though some experts are furious over the degree of the spying of the United States' National Security Agency exposed by former contractor Edward Snowden, the Internet specialists are even more worried about enemies that are technically sophisticated enough to use malware to wipe out data on computer drives, sabotage utilities and steal trade and defense secrets, according to The Star.

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The proposals and fears about new laws and executive actions to prevent the cyber-threats were central subjects at the Black Hat and DEF CON conferences, two of the globe's biggest assemblies for Internet security experts and hackers. The conferences were held on Aug. 7 through Aug. 10 in Las Vegas, Nev.

Geer, the security researcher and keynote speaker at the Black Hat conference, tackled the global and national policy concerns from the get-go. In the same way that the first lethal cases of illnesses should be reported to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the U.S. government should also require a detailed report about prominent security breaches on the Internet.

Essential industries should undergo "stress tests" for the regulators to find out if their companies are capable of withstanding an attack from compromised equipment, or from the internet, Geer said.

He also suggested that software vendors that do not disclose their source codes and bugs in their software that lead to big deficits from unwarranted modifications and access should be exposed to product liability suits.

"Either software houses deliver quality and back it up with product liability, or they will have to let their users protect themselves," said Geer. "The current situation - users can't see whether they need to protect themselves and have no recourse to being unprotected - cannot go on," he said.

Tagshackers, Black hat, DEF CON, Cybercriminals, internet security