White House calls summit on open source security following Log4j attacks

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Following the fallout from the recently disclosed Log4j vulnerability, the White House will meet with US tech giants to discuss the security of open source software.

In addition to Apple, Google, Amazon, Meta, IBM and Microsoft, the Apache Software Foundation which owns and maintains the Log4j library, Oracle, GitHub and the Linux Open Source Foundation will attend the meeting with the Biden administration as well.

Executives from all of the tech companies attending the meeting will also meet with representatives from a number of US government agencies including the Commerce Department, Defense Department, Energy Department and Homeland Security. However, other agencies such as the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the National Science Foundation will participate in the meeting too.

A key national security concern

Back in December of last year, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan sent a letter to the CEOs of US tech companies following the discovery of the Log4Shell vulnerability in Apache's popular java logging framework Log4j.

In his letter, Sullivan said that the security of open source software is a “key national security concern” as it is used broadly and maintained by volunteers. As such, vulnerabilities in open source software can affect loads of other products and projects as demonstrated by 2014's Heartbleed flaw in OpenSSL which at the time, was believed to be used in two out of every three servers.

More recently, a disgruntled developer took down thousands of open source projects by corrupting two widely used open source libraries on GitHub. The developer cited the fact that he no longer wants to create free code for commercial companies making millions as the reason for his actions.

We'll likely hear more from each of the individual companies that attended the meeting in the following days as well as from the White House on its plans to improve the security of open source projects and software.

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Via The Verge

After working with the TechRadar Pro team for the last several years, Anthony is now the security and networking editor at Tom’s Guide where he covers everything from data breaches and ransomware gangs to the best way to cover your whole home or business with Wi-Fi. When not writing, you can find him tinkering with PCs and game consoles, managing cables and upgrading his smart home.