"I hope to help the ancient communications machine take some steps forward," Burke told the Corriere della Sera newspaper Monday.

"I've been dealing with the Vatican for 25 years as a journalist, it will be interesting to see how it works on the inside," he said.

Burke, 52, a member of the conservative Opus Dei movement, said his new position "will be a challenge," but he hoped to help the Vatican revolutionise its use of the Internet, particularly in English, and better public relations.

"I see the Holy See's press office as a large ship that travels very slowly. I'm certainly not going to jump on board like a marine, I'm going to be prudent," he added.

The Vatican has been overwhelmed in recent years by a widespread and highly damaging clerical sex abuse scandal, and has had to deal this year with intense media speculation over an alleged power struggle at the heart of the Holy See.

It has been caught out in a number of embarrassing blunders since Pope Benedict XVI's election, including the pontiff's move in 2009 to welcome back into the fold a dissident Holocaust-denying bishop.

Burke will work alongside the Vatican's spokesman, Federico Lombardi.