Lt Col Maxie Thom, USAF

National Defense Fellow

Visiting Air Force Researcher

University Park Campus, DM 434C

(305) 348-1920

thomm@fiu.edu

Information Warfare

Capabilities and Policy Issues

Agenda

• Define IW

• Capabilities

• Policy Issues

Definition

• It is Not– Hacking into a school computer– Denial of service attack against e-commerce

• It is– DoD Technical View of IW : “information

itself is now a realm, a weapon, and a target”

Working Definition

Information warfare is comprised of operations directed against information in any form, transmitted over any media, including operations against information content, its supporting systems and software, the physical hardware device that stores the data or instructions, and also human practices and perceptions

Information Operations (IO)

• Military Information Warfare

• IO is conducted during time of crisis or conflict to affect adversary information and information systems while defending one's own information and systems

History

". . . attaining one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the pinnacle of excellence. Subjugating the enemy's army without fighting is the true pinnacle of excellence."

Sun Tzu, The Art of War

History

"There are but two powers in the world, the sword and the mind. In the long run the sword is always beaten by the mind."

Napoleon Bonaparte

Core Capabilities

• Psychological Operations (PSYOPS)

• Military Deception (MILDEC)

• Operations Security (OPSEC)

• Computer Network Operations (CNO)

• Electronic Warfare (EW)

PSYOPS

• Definition : Planned operations to convey selected information and indicators to foreign audiences to influence their emotions, motives, objective reasoning, and ultimately the behavior of foreign governments, organizations, groups, and individuals.

• Purpose: Induce or reinforce foreign attitudes and behavior favorable to the originator's objectives.

PSYOP (Weapons)

• Email, Faxes, Cell phones– Encouraged Iraqi leaders to abandon support

• Broadcast– Encouraged fielded troops to not fight

• Leaflets– Variety of themes

MILDEC

• Definition: Actions executed to deliberately mislead adversary military decision makers with regard to friendly military capabilities, intentions, and operations, thereby causing the adversary to take specific actions (or inactions) that will contribute to the success of the friendly military operation.

• Purpose: Guide an enemy into making mistakes by presenting false information, images, or statements

MILDEC (Weapons)

• Operations– MINCEMEAT “The Man That Never Was”

• Camouflage– Mockups “Aircraft on a stick”

• Electronic– Tactical Air Launched Decoy (TALD)

OPSEC

“The formation and procedure used by the military should not be divulged beforehand.”

Sun Tzu, The Art of War

OPSEC (Definition)

A process of identifying and analyzing information that is critical to friendly operations: (a) identify which information can be observed by adversary intelligence systems(b) determine indicators that hostile intelligence systems might piece together to derive critical information in time to be useful to adversaries, (c) select and execute measures that eliminate or reduce the vulnerability of friendly actions to adversary exploitation.

CNO

• The ability to attack and disrupt enemy computer networks, protect military information systems, and exploit enemy computer networks through intelligence collection.– CNA– CND– CNE

CNO (CNA)

• Operations conducted to disrupt, deny, degrade, or destroy information resident in computers and computer networks, or the computers and networks themselves.– Viruses– Trojan Horses

CNO (CND)

• Protect and defend information, computers, and networks from nasty D’s

• It utilizes security measures to keep the enemy from learning about U.S. military capabilities and intentions.

• Includes actions taken to protect, monitor, analyze, detect and respond to unauthorized activity within DOD information systems and networks.

• CND focuses on detecting or stopping intrusions, whereas OPSEC focuses on identifying and reducing vulnerabilities

– Firewalls - Encryption

EW

• Any military action involving the use of electromagnetic (EM) or directed energy to manipulate the EM spectrum or to attack an adversary– Jamming– TALD– Stealth (RAM)– High Power Microwave (HPM)

CNA vs. EW

CNA relies on interpreted signals in a data stream to execute an attack

EW relies more on the power of electromagnetic energy

QUESTIONS

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Implications

• Policy

• Law

Policy Issues

• NSPD 16 (classified)…Jul 2002– PSYOP that affect friendly nations

– National Security Vulnerability of dependency

– Legal issues resulting from use of cyberweapons

Law of Armed Conflict

The LOAC arises from a desire among civilized nations to prevent unnecessary suffering and destruction while not impeding the effective waging of war. A part of public international law (precedence), LOAC regulates the conduct of armed hostilities. It also aims to protect civilians, prisoners of war, the wounded, sick, and shipwrecked. LOAC applies to international armed conflicts and in the conduct of military operations and related activities in armed conflict, however such conflicts are characterized.

- Hot Pursuit - Self Defense

QUESTIONS

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