Turkey to rewrite software source codes of 204 F-16 fighters

[Pete]

Turkey to rewrite software source codes of 204 F-16 fighters

http://www.todayszaman.com/news-2614...-fighters.html

"The US administration agreed in principle almost two months ago for the transfer of information over software source codes of US Lockheed Martin-made F-16 fighters to Turkey.


Once the agreement is completed, and if approved by the US Congress, Turkey will have the capability to automatically modify the software source codes of the fighters’ weapons systems with national software source codes, said US sources who asked not to be named.Turkey will become the first nation among 26 to have the F-16s in their inventories and have the ability to receive information on the F-16 fighters’ software source codes -- primarily their weapons systems -- thereby enabling it to replace them with national software source codes whenever necessary................"

&

"..............Meanwhile, it is not clear whether the US administration will seek US congressional authorization for another long-standing Turkish request for the sale of four Predator unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and two armed Reaper UAVs.

However, some of the weapons, including Predators that the US reportedly pledged to transfer to Turkey as it withdraws from Iraq in December of this year, are said to not be subject to the approval of the US Congress. These are weapons the US used during its war in Iraq..................."

[BOfH]

Hmm, having the source code allows for "white-box" vulnerability analysis of said code, I know security by obscurity(compiled code in this case) is just a delay tactic, not true security, but this brings a whole new level of concern with it. What if they find something we missed; weaponized exploits for vulnerabilities in F-16 weapons systems = VeryBad™ IMHO.