NSA and CISA Push for Memory-Safe Programming Languages

The US National Security Agency (NSA) and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) have jointly issued guidance urging software developers to adopt memory-safe programming languages like Rust and Go. The report highlights memory safety vulnerabilities as a leading cause of software security issues, citing C and C++ as particularly vulnerable due to their memory management mechanisms. While projects aim to improve C/C++ security, a long-term shift to memory-safe languages is presented as the best risk mitigation strategy. Government initiatives, such as DARPA's TRACTOR program (which aims to automatically translate C code to Rust), are actively promoting this transition.