YONGSAN GARRISON, South Korea — Registration has opened for the 2004 NETOPS Training Conference, which brings military signal personnel and other interested parties together with vendors showing the latest in high-tech information technology systems.

This year, the conference is titled “Managing Information Technology for the Future Force,” and will run Oct. 25-29 at the Capital Hotel in Seoul, next to Yongsan Garrison.

“The training conference provides an overview of key information management issues and policies that specifically relate to the Korean theater,” wrote William Lane, deputy regional chief of the Network Enterprise Technology Command, in an announcement of the conference.

“Changes in the IM area will make this conference a significant training event.”

One particular focus will be on Internet attacks, viruses and other forms of malicious computer activities, organizers said.

Some of the conference panels will focus on the latest computer network protection programs and “issues dealing with intrusion detection and data protection,” Lane wrote.

Military computer network officials have said that in recent years, computer attacks — both of the common “spam” type e-mails and more specifically targeted viruses — have become of great concern. With so many of the military’s administrative and operational functions heavily reliant on technology, computer attacks have become another option for potential enemies, officials have said.

Earlier this year, regional computer officials estimated tens of thousands of computer viruses, from potentially pesky to possibly crippling, attack military systems each day.

Most often the viruses simply cause loss of work hours taken to “debug” a computer; military computer experts say the most common are “worms” or “Trojan horses.” Worms often target big commercial Web sites in an effort to shut them down.

Trojan horses are seemingly normal e-mails that hide a destructive virus. They often destroy information on disks, make systems crash and steal information.

The biggest problems, officials have said, are viruses introduced by servicemembers who do some of their official computer work at home, away from the protection of military computer network anti-virus programs.

For more information on the NETOPS conference, or to register, e-mail: gary-gnidziejko@us.army.mil.

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