Justin Lynch, Author at Air Force TImes

Why cyberwar is contributing to a potential doomsday

Justin Lynch — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 02:27:42 +0000

A wave of new cyberattacks and an increase in information warfare tactics are helping to create an existential threat to humanity, according to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, who said in their annual report that its Doomsday Clock “is two minutes to midnight.”

The group of top researchers, scientists and thinkers warned Jan. 24 that the world is in a “new abnormal” state of crisis that is comparable when the United States pursued the hydrogen bomb in 1952. Since 1947, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has released a report that uses the clock as an indicator of how close the world is to an existential threat to humanity, or midnight.

As institutions and government agencies face a proliferation of hacking ― attacks that often undercut humanity’s trust in those organizations ― the new fears fuel the state of crisis, said Herb Lin, senior research scholar for cyber policy and security at Stanford University and contributor to the report.

“The lack of cybersecurity for your systems is dangerous because it reduces confidence in the infrastructure,” Lin told Fifth Domain. He gave an example of how fears of election hacking can undermine voting confidence.

Officials from the Department of Homeland Security shared a similar sentiment during the mid-term election season. While the elections went off without acknowledgement of such an incident occurring, Lin cited it as an example of how “the lack of cybersecurity is reducing confidence in democracy.”

He described the threat as an “insidious use of cyber technology and cyber tools to target and exploit weaknesses in human cognition and thinking.”

In its annual report, the group warned that “rather than a cyber Armageddon that causes financial meltdown or nationwide electrical blackouts,” a larger risk is the use of cyber-enabled information warfare that erodes “the trust and cohesion on which civilized societies rely.”

Evidence shows, however, that such disinformation campaigns occurred during the 2018 midterm elections.

“Russia, and other foreign countries, including China and Iran, conducted influence activities and messaging campaigns targeted at the United States to promote their strategic interests,” Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats said in a review of the mid-term election’s security.

To stem the tide of cyber and information warfare, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists suggested a collaborative approach between countries.

“The international community should begin multilateral discussions that aim to discourage cyber-enabled information warfare,” the group said in its annual report.

However, rallying major powers around an agreed upon set of norms has so far been unsuccessful in cyberspace. The prospects for future cohesion appear to be slim.

Discussions between countries at the United Nations over cyber norms have stumbled because of differences between Russia, China and the United States regarding how international humanitarian law should be applied.

Although the United States and China agreed to halt the hacking and use of business secrets in 2015, experts say the measure did not work.

CENTCOM chief: The future of warfare demands more cyber authorities

Justin Lynch — Tue, 18 Dec 2018 19:14:12 +0000

The Pentagon has received more power to conduct cyber operations in the past 18 months. But for the top Army commander in the Middle East and Central Asia, the new authority is not enough.

The head of U.S. Central Command, Gen. Joseph Votel, wrote in a Dec. 18 paper that the Pentagon must “normalize” electronic warfare and cyberattacks and incorporate them into daily operations.

“Normalizing the cyberspace domain means broader authorities that are more responsive than current bureaucratic processes,” Votel wrote in the Army’s Cyber Defense Review. “It also means we need simple and streamlined organizations and processes to increase lethality and enhance performance.”

The paper was coauthored by Votel, Maj. Gen. Julazadeh and Maj. Weilun Lin.

“Our failure to operationalize and normalize the cyberspace domain effectively cedes it to our adversaries, gives them a competitive advantage and, ultimately, creates an increased attack vector against our objectives,” the authors said.

President Trump gave the Pentagon new authorities to conduct cyber operations in August and minimized the process where other agencies can object to cyberattacks, known as “deconfliction.”

Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis can conduct hacking operations without approval from the White House so long as they do not interfere with the American “national interest,” according to four current and former White House and intelligence officials who were either part of internal deliberations or briefed on the changes.

Yet some current and former U.S. officials are skeptical that the new authorities will mean more effective hacking operations for the Pentagon, because it does not solve the nuances of cyberattacks.

But the new mandates do not go far enough for the three officer authors, who argued that cyberwarfare should be under the same authorities as other types of operations.

“We must not see cyberspace as drastically different and separate from other domains that we create new processes to prepare, plan and fight in this new domain. We continue to seek processes that smooth and simplify operations, reducing friendly friction and accelerating decision-making.”

Current and former Pentagon officials have pointed to conducting cyberattacks against enemies that use networks of neutral or partner nations as an area where the Pentagon has changed its decision-making process in recent years. Those officials also pointed to how the Pentagon was able to use hybrid warfare tactics during the 2016 liberation of Mosul, Iraq, as a textbook example of future hybrid operations.

Votel, Julazadeh and Lin echoed the sentiment of other Pentagon officials who have advocated for cyberattacks, electronic warfare and other information operations to be integrated earlier in military operations.

“We need to proactively execute cyberspace and information operations early in ‘Phase 0 / steady state’ of the planning process — well before operation execution. Only then can we shape the [information environment], hold our adversaries’ capabilities at risk and execute at the speed of war,” the three wrote.

For example, Pentagon officials say they closely monitored Russia’s 2014 hybrid war in Ukraine and learned from Moscow’s tactics.

Votel, Julazadeh and Lin shed light on the changes, writing that information operations were previously “integrated as an afterthought.” Yet over the last two years, Central Command has incorporated cyberattacks, electronic warfare and military deception at the “strategic level.”

And this hybrid warfare has driven new acquisition demands in the Pentagon.

“We need technology and capabilities to keep pace with the operational environment and continue to build the partnerships to do so,” the three officers wrote.

In recent years, Central Command has bolstered its hybrid warfare through new contracts. The centerpiece of that effort is a July 2017 contract worth $621 million to Science Applications International Corporation for IT support to Central Command that could last seven years.

In August 2018, Vistra communications was also awarded a $22 million contract to support offensive and defensive cyber operations for Central Command.

Why the Air Force is investing $100M in AI

Justin Lynch — Thu, 06 Dec 2018 18:33:33 +0000

The Air Force plans to invest $100 million over three years to research automated cyber and signals intelligence processing, according to the service.

Automatically sorting through emails, phone conversations and other types of collected signals will help the Air Force because “time is critical” and the intelligence “analysts’ workload is high,” said the Dec. 4 initial announcement.

“Automated signal processing is a key component for net-centric warfare,” the Air Force Research Lab wrote, adding they were interested in areas of research that included commercial signal processing capabilities and improving systems already in the field. Information from the gathering and processing “provides the continuous decision-quality information necessary to successfully employ air, space and cyber operations.”

The research is divided into three categories.

First, the Air Force Research Lab is investing in information extraction, or identifying and cataloging information on a mass scale. Second, the research will look into signals processing, which catalogues the information. Finally, the Air Force Research Lab is looking into automation enhancements, or the ability to quickly recall information once stored.

The announcement was also an effort to research new methods that can bring the Doppler effect, or the ability to manipulate radio frequency.

“The goals for this component are to develop methods for the detection, identification, characterization and geolocation of emerging communications and low-radiated power level signals,” the agency said.

The announcement comes as the U.S. government has embraced artificial intelligence for cybersecurity and signals collection.

In September, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency announced that it would invest more than $2 billion in artificial intelligence programs, which included creating better algorithms, reasoning and enhancing security. Currently, there are more than 60 programs at DARPA that have an element of AI, according to the agency. That is in addition to the agency’s Artificial Intelligence Exploration program, announced in July, which provides rapid funding opportunities.

The Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity’s Mercury Program also researches how to automatically analyze foreign signals in order to predict military and political events.

When asked what investments Cyber Command is making now that they hope to pay off in the future, Capt. Ed Devinney responded “anything with AI and machine learning” during Fifth Domain’s CyberCon 2018, which was held in November.

“There aren’t that many people who do AI that well,” Devinney said. “There is a growing understanding and consensus that we need to operate at machine speed, especially talking about active defense of the network.”

Air Force moves to boost cyber and electronic warfare efforts

Justin Lynch — Fri, 30 Nov 2018 22:05:01 +0000

The Air Force plans to award a sole-source contract with a New Mexico university to boost the service’s hybrid warfare training.

The announcement comes as the service is embracing the integration of electronic and physical fighting tactics.

In a Nov. 28 announcement, the Air Force said it would partner with the New Mexico Institution of Mining and Technology to establish a center for the research and development of methods to merge cyber and physical warfare.

The Air Force described an “urgent need for a cyber-kinetic infrastructure” and to evaluate the integration of electronic and physical effects. In particular, Air Force said it was seeking “techniques by which objects and events can be sensed or manipulated via transducers and kinetic actuators on cyber-connected devices.”

Ranges that are available do not have “credible cyber system capabilities to support regular use,” the announcement said.

The decision is one of a series of moves by the Pentagon to spur its hybrid warfare efforts.

In 2017, the U.S. Army unveiled its cyberspace and electronic warfare operations manual, which emphasized the integration of digital and kinetic effects. It means that any operation will fuse together digital and physical effects.

The Army is doubling the size of its electronic warfare force and is nearly doubling the training those troops receive before they are deployed, Brig. Gen. Jennifer Buckner said during an Oct. 8 event. The Pentagon awarded General Dynamics a $64 million, five-year contract to support its electronic warfare integrated laboratory Nov. 28. And the Army is considering expanding its dismounted electronic warfare capabilities, the service said Nov. 14.

Inside the Pentagon’s struggle to build a cyber force

Justin Lynch — Mon, 29 Oct 2018 21:46:34 +0000

The Pentagon is taking new steps to build cyber talent in the U.S. military, but experts suggest the armed forces have structural problems that prevent them from becoming a digitally cohesive unit.

Current and former U.S. military officials also tell Fifth Domain that recruiting enough cyber forces is a struggle for the Pentagon.

The U.S. Air Force’s cyber warfare operations is only 46 percent filled, according to a 2016 Air Force Research Institute report, the most recent year available.

The Pentagon is hoping to hire 8,300 cyber positions starting this year, Brig. Gen. Dennis Crall told lawmakers Sept. 26.

“It’s difficult to recruit competent quality that we’re looking for in every part of the country. In some cases, it’s due to high-demand, low-density assets,” Crall said. “There’s just really a strict competition. In other place, they just don’t exist, writ large, where we need them.”

“We recognize that we are in a competition for talent,” Gen. Richard Angle told reporters at an Aug. 8 roundtable. He said that the Army is currently recruiting enough cyber soldiers but if the force wants to grow, it will have to increase its retention. “This is a very high-demand space with a low density population to draw from.”

Angle said that the Pentagon is considering changing the ratio of civilian and military officials in its national mission force, although no decision has been made.

Noting its issues, the Pentagon has taken some steps to attract and retain talent.

The Department of Defense announced Oct. 25 that it is opening the Tatooine workspace in Augusta, Georgia, a facility that will house civilian and military officials working on cyber issues.

In the new work space, Pentagon officials will be working together in “unclassified, collaborative, startup-like spaces using technology and tools found in the private sector,” the Department of Defense said in a statement.

The partnership will “serve as a powerful retention and recruitment tool,” said Lieutenant General Stephen Fogarty, which is expected to occur because top tech talent will be cultivated and supported with the program.

Projects included in the new center include hunting for adversaries in Pentagon networks and redesigning training for cyber soldiers, as well as drone-detection technologies.

This summer, U.S. Cyber Command also went on a hiring spree and created a new process to recruit professionals. The new process included on-the-spot job offers and the first-ever public hiring event.

But the new steps are not likely to be enough, according to former military officials. They tell Fifth Domain that the Pentagon needs to consider using civilians for some tasks.

“We really need to think hard about what needs to be in uniform, what is nice to be in uniform, and what just needs to be done,” said Bryson Bort, a former U.S. Army officer and the founder of SCYTHE, a cybersecurity firm.

“There is a lack of understanding in the combat arms about what cyber could be beyond the latest du jour.”

Hiring cyber talent is a national security priority, a 2018 Defense Science Board report argued.

“The recruiting challenge in the military is especially challenging because of the competition they face with the private sector,” Dave Weinstein, a former official at U.S. cyber command told Fifth Domain.

“A lot of DoD roles are not open to civilians. If the Pentagon approach staffing agnostic of whether or not the person wears a uniform for cyber, they might expand their access to human capital.”

How to protect jets, missiles and ships from cyberattacks

Justin Lynch — Wed, 10 Oct 2018 20:18:33 +0000

Hackers pierced the weapon system’s terminal, giving them the ability to feed operators false commands or spoof logistics. But instead, the intruders opted to display a taunting message across the screen, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office. They chose a time-tested instruction.

“Insert two quarters to continue operating.”

In this case, the the hackers in question were red-team testers discovering vulnerabilities in Pentagon weapons systems under development. The prank was just one example that was included in a 50-page report that that underscored just how susceptible American military weapons are to cyberattacks. The report did not name the particular weapon system that offered arcade style instruction, but it fit the description of a drone.

While the Pentagon has a weapons portfolio of roughly $1.66 trillion, the GAO found that “nearly all” American missiles, jets, ships and lethal equipment under development are vulnerable cyberattacks. Testing showed that hackers could infiltrate weapons systems in development with “relatively simple tools and techniques” that included guessing passwords, using publicly available software and scanning systems, according to the October report.

In one case, a test team was able to infiltrate a weapons platform by guessing the administrator’s password in nine seconds. In another example, passwords for weapons had not been changed from their default settings, which were quickly found over the internet.

The extent of the problem is not known, according to the report, because “for a number of reasons, tests were limited in scope and sophistication.” But without correction, the test meant the potentially hacked system could alert the enemy to an incoming attack or not working altogether.

The Pentagon’s “own testing shows they can be pretty easily hacked,” Cristina Chaplain, a director for contracting and national security acquisitions at the GAO said on an agency podcast. “People look at weapons and think they are automatically very different than their home computers or the business networks that we see getting attacked every day, but they are not so different.”

The report only reviewed weapons that were in development as opposed to those in the field. Chaplain said she hoped before the systems are deployed the vulnerabilities would be discovered, but “it’s not a guarantee”

A string of high-profile hacks which have resulted in the pilfering of some of America’s most closely guarded weapons details. A Chinese man pled guilty in 2016 to stealing sensitive details of the C-17 Globemaster, and Lockheed F-35 and F-22 stealth fighters. And in early 2018, Chinese hackers stole “massive amounts of highly sensitive data related to undersea warfare” from a naval contractor, according to the Washington Post.

“It looks grim unless they really see this as a wake-up call and start taking actions in a serious manner,” Chaplain said. Until recently, the Pentagon “was not prioritizing cyber to the extent it should in the development process.”

How to protect weapons

Experts laid out a series of proposals for Fifth Domain on the best ways to boost cybersecurity of weapons. The task will require a culture of cyber hygiene, resilient systems and a workforce overhaul, the experts said.

In the agency podcast, Chaplain said a number of basic steps could be taken to change “cultural issues” of cybersecurity inside the Pentagon’s weapons procurement program, including better password management and securing weapons from development to deployment.

There is “a culture right now at [the Department of Defense] where we feel like the extent of this problem really isn’t appreciated at the program level,” Chaplain said.

The Pentagon should expect that hackers will break into its weapon systems and as a result the department should build resiliency into its systems, Jamie Stevenson, chief technology officer at the advanced solutions group of Leidos, told Fifth Domain. Leidos is one of the prime cybersecurity and network contractors for the U.S. government.

“You are looking at the ultimate game of cat and mouse. It is one of those things that there are always going to be new vulnerabilities” Stevenson said. The question becomes “how can you bake resiliency into your system.”

Raytheon is building a layered approach to securing weapons systems because it also expects hackers to discover vulnerabilities, Todd Probert, a vice president for the defense contractor’s mission support and modernization department told Fifth Domain. Raytheon is also one of the prime cybersecurity and defense contractors of the U.S. government.

“On one end of the spectrum, it is just IT, going back to updates that come out for operating systems and regular patches and staying current with them,” Probert said. “A little further up the food chain, the processes for how we build software has fundamentally changed over the past five to 10 years.” He added that it is important to test code before it is deployed for bugs.

But the GAO report also said that one of the largest challenges the Pentagon faces in protecting weapons from cyberattacks is hiring and retaining personnel who are qualified for the job. It has been a problem not just for the Pentagon, but for the entire U.S. government.

“Maintaining a cybersecurity workforce is a challenge government-wide and that this issue has been a high-priority across the government for years.”

Polar fitness app broadcasted sensitive details of intelligence and service members

Justin Lynch — Mon, 09 Jul 2018 02:58:38 +0000

Military officials working at nuclear weapons facilities. FBI and NSA employees. Americans in the sensitive Green Zone of Bagdad, Iraq.

These are some of the military or intelligence officials who could be identified using public data from the popular Polar Flow fitness platform, according to an investigation by the news website Bellingcat and the Dutch news agency De Correspondent. The public data could be a gold-mine of sensitive information and represents one of the largest open-source security vulnerabilities for the Department of Defense since a similar lapse was found in the Strava exercise app in January.

More than 6,500 users who worked at more than 200 sensitive sites across the world appear to have been unknowingly broadcasting their exercise location and their name to the entire world, according to the joint investigation.

Bellingcat was able to pinpoint the name of a “high-ranking officer” at a base known to host nuclear weapons. It took just a few clicks. Using the Polar Flow app and other information found on the internet, De Correspondent was able to collect a disturbing amount of one Dutch solider’s personal information. They found the name of the solider, the fact he was stationed at one of the key locations where the war against the Islamic State is being waged from, the soldier’s home address, and the names of his wife and kids.

Because of its broad search functions, public data appears to be easier to find in the Polar Flow application compared to the Strava fitness website.

Due to the joint investigation, Polar has disabled the ability to search for exercise data on its platform. In a statement, the company said that “there has been no breach of private data,” and that users must “opt-in” to have their training locations public. Polar reminded users “to avoid publicly sharing GPS files of sensitive locations.”

The investigation comes as the Department of Defense has warned its employees and soldiers to be aware of the information it chooses to make public over the internet.“

Protect your health, biometrics and financial information,” wrote Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis in a June memo. “The potential consequences of compromised data could be serious, not just for you and your families, but for the readiness and resiliency of this department.”

A spokesperson for Polar and the Department of Defense were not immediately available for comment.

Air Force to shift cyber authority

Justin Lynch — Fri, 08 Jun 2018 15:51:12 +0000

The Air Force is shifting its cyber operations to Air Combat Command, the service announced on June 7, a decision designed to bolster its digital combat readiness.

Under the new structure, Air Combat Command will be responsible for organizing, training and equipping the service to conduct “full-spectrum cyber missions and operations.”

Previously, cyber responsibilities in the Air Force were under Space Command.

“Integrating cyber operations and intelligence in cyber capabilities under one command is a significant step towards enhancing our war-fighting capabilities to conduct multidomain operations,” said Gen. Jay Raymond, head of Air Force Space Command, in a statement.

Seventy-two airmen and civilians will be reassigned from Peterson Air Force base in Colorado to Virginia because of the realignment, according to the Colorado Springs Gazette. The shift means that cyber operations will return to Air Combat Command, where it was previously located.

“This move will drive faster decisions as we fight by realigning the cyber operations and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions under the same command,” Secretary of the Air Force Heather Wilson said in a statement.

Air Combat Command is expected to take over responsibilities in the summer of 2018.

Japanese peacekeepers arrive in South Sudan with new powers

Justin Lynch — Mon, 21 Nov 2016 15:10:56 +0000

JUBA, South Sudan — Japanese peacekeepers, with a broader mandate to use force, landed in South Sudan on Monday, the first overseas deployment of the country’s troops with those expanded powers in nearly 70 years.

Dressed in green camouflage uniform, squad leader Yoshino Tanaka stepped off the plane at the head of the Japanese group. He was greeted by and shook hands with Japan’s ambassador to South Sudan, Masahiko Kiya.

The 350 Self-Defense Forces will replace a previous contingent of Japanese peacekeepers who served in the United Nations Mission in South Sudan, but did not have mandate to use force. The new troops will be tasked with engineering and construction in the capital, Juba.

For the first time since the end of World War II, these peacekeepers will have the ability to use force to protect civilians, U.N. staff and themselves. Japan’s constitution, drafted under U.S. direction after the war, forbids the use of force in settling international disputes but the government has reinterpreted the constitution to allow Japanese troops to use force in some situations.

Approved by the Japanese legislature in 2015, the expanded capacity to use of force was opposed by some in Japan who feared that it could entangle the country’s military in an overseas conflict and that it violates Japan’s anti-war constitution.

But Japanese Prime Minister Shinto Abe argued that the broader military powers give Japan the ability to respond to growing threats that include China’s increasing military assertiveness and North Korea’s nuclear ambitions.

The deployment shows the growing trust the Japanese public places in its Self-Defense Forces, Sheila Smith, a senior fellow for Japan studies at the Council on Foreign Relations told the Associated Press.

However she said that many “people are worried that this first case of the Self-Defense Forces’ greater powers could run into problems and be put into a bad situation in South Sudan.”

The forces’ expanded powers will first be tested in the troubled East African nation that has seen continuous fighting since its civil war broke out in December 2013. There are more than 12,000 U.N. peacekeepers already in South Sudan who have faced criticism for failing to protect civilians.

In July, two Chinese peacekeepers died and five others were wounded after their vehicle was struck with a rocket propelled grenade as fighting swept Juba.

Japan’s Self-Defense Forces will still not be able to engage with an opposing army — like South Sudan’s — the only force that is in the capital, said the Council on Foreign Relations’ Smith.

“It’s not as if Japan has unleashed its military,” she said.