And how will we deal with criminal computers?
Companies suspect China of organising mini-raids to ransack Western know-how: but it could just have easily been Western criminals, computer-hackers showing off or disillusioned former employees.
But Mr Comey said the data was not properly entered in federal criminal justice computer systems, or had been mishandled by an analyst with the National Instant Criminal Background Check System.
LAST winter, Sean Thakkar, a criminal justice computer expert in California, was driving down a freeway when he heard a radio interview with an author who had written a book about the murders of a doctor's family in Cheshire, Conn., in July 2007.
"Today's criminals with computer savvy are clocking (rolling back) digital odometers at an astonishing rate," said Eric Widmer, vice president of sales and operations at AIM, in a media release.
Terrorists, fraudsters, rogue states and individual activists are among the criminals targeting computer systems in the UK.
"The research and development that we are now seeing [from criminals] proves that the computer criminals are spending a lot of money," said Mark Sunner, chief technology officer for Messagelabs - the computer security company which, among other things, has the task of protecting the government's email.
It said: "Andrey Ghinkul, aka Andrei Ghincul and Smilex, 30, of Moldova, was charged in a nine-count indictment unsealed today in the western district of Pennsylvania with criminal conspiracy, unauthorised computer access with intent to defraud, damaging a computer, wire fraud and bank fraud.
Some schools have introduced a multidisciplinary major that incorporates accounting with criminal justice and computer science.
Orin Kerr is a law professor at George Washington University, specializing in criminal law and computer crime.
