U.S.: a Critical Air-Traffic Tool Goes Down

U.S.: A Critical Air-Traffic Tool Goes Down

Summary
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration's National Airspace Data Interchange Network came to a screeching halt Aug. 26 -- along with the nation's air traffic -- when one of its two hubs crashed in Atlanta.
Analysis
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) [temporarily? yes] lost one if its two National Airspace Data Interchange Network (NADIN) switches when the system crashed in Atlanta Aug. 26 (the other NADIN switch is in Salt Lake City). [Was the Atlanta switch restored? If so, after how long and what effect? As of right now, we haven’t heard that. But it should be a fixable problem.]

An essential tool for the coordination of the nation's air traffic, NADIN is used by pilots and air- traffic controllers to manage flight plans. If the NADIN database becomes corrupted, flight-plan data must be entered manually, causing flight delays. The system has a history of technical issues, and resulting travel disruptions are not out of the ordinary.
But there is always the concern that crops up with computer problems on this scale -- concern about the possibility of a significant computer hack. The history of NADIN issues argues against this. Back in June 2007, a system crash -- also in Atlanta -- caused similar delays. The similarity with today's crash -- at least based on available information so far -- is noteworthy.

· [Month? Don’t have that] 1998 – NADIN system installed, supplied by now-defunct Dutch firm.

· July 1991 – NADIN system begins running (capacity unknown).

· January 1994 – NADIN system becomes partially operational.[but didn’t it begin running in 1991? what’s the difference? Dropping all the “originals” can cut this particular one from the timeline entirely]

· December 1994 – Original NADIN system becomes fully operational.

· 2000[can’t we be more specific about month? Don’t have it] -- NADIN system [partially? Let’s just say “crashes” to be consistent with our later references] fails.

· November 2003 – FAA officially formalizes NADIN protocol.

· March 2005 – Contract awarded for NextGen[is this formal system or techspeak? This is the only way I’ve seen it referred to anywhere. Formal name] NADIN replacement. NADIN is processing 1.5 million messages daily at this point. The FAA begins replaceing the old Phillips DS714 mainframes with new servers that use Intel processors.

· June 2007 – NADIN Atlanta crashes.

· Aug. 2008 – NADIN Atlanta crashes again.

Nevertheless, at a time of heightened tensions between the United States and Russia (and a constant online onslaught from <link nid="121140">China</link>), the latest NADIN crash does serve as a reminder that there are governments in the world not always friendly to Washington that have significant capabilities in cyberspace. Although, in the case of Russia, an isolated attack on a single computer system is not exactly a primary modus operandi (an assessment based on the far more comprehensive assaults on <link nid="114996">Estonia</link> and <link nid="121894">Georgia</link>).
Even more important, regardless of what caused the Aug. 26 NADIN crash, is the monumental challenge the event underscores. Here an archaic system that had survived nearly seven years of Sept. 11 overhauls went down, dumping its entire workload on one other switch. This particular[The NADIN? Yes. ] system had already been partially upgraded with systems from Lockheed Martin and is slated to be replaced altogether with the FAA's much-hyped NextGen Air Traffic Control system [when? “in the coming years” it’s a messy and complicated process we don’t want to get into from what I can tell.]. But the lack of redundancy and dynamism demonstrated again by the latest NADIN crash makes a cyberattack against critical U.S. infrastructure all the more feasible. And the costs of comprehensive upgrading these systems would be an enormous financial investment, far more than we have seen so far in the years following 9/11.