Full Autonomy

Kill Switch

Tanks for Tech

Today I have a slightly older article for you all (found right here), but one that is all the more relevant since its date of publishing since technology continues to be a prolific element of modern combat. Essentially it concerns itself with how the digital battlefield is beginning to mimic the real battlefield, how the next generation of the armed forces are being created to cope with digital threats and how much of a priority reliable, computer-savvy individuals are to the military.

As you can see, the dogma that follows soldiers in non-combat roles is being erased at an alarming pace, to such an extent that digital 'maneuvers' and 'live-fire' exercises are being carried out regularly. What does this indicate about the focus of our military? News of cyber-warfare is so rare, yet it seems to be the most relevant item on the military agenda, what is the potential for the concept of cyber-warfare? Can anybody foresee a world in which military prowess is dictated by the strength of a computer system? Are we already at that point?

The Virus and the Common Cold

As our freshman class of 2015 coughs and hacks into week four of Stanford, a news headline caught my eye that reminded me how closely a computer virus parallels the common cold. The prevalence of organisms (namely human beings) on planet Earth ensures that there have, and always will be, vectors available for viruses to infect. Likewise, the increasing prevalence of computers in the modern world ensures that there will always be a new medium for computer viruses, whether they are used as targeted weapons or not.

As you can read here, the Air Force recently experienced a loss of control at one of their operating bases that flies UAV 'drones'. The interesting angle in this case is that the virus that infected the system was not a directed attack, but a simple passkey logger; originally intended to steal passwords from computer users playing online games.

Does this say something about the prevalence of computers in our society? Does the fact that we are 'wired' at all times make us vulnerable to a new phenomenon or perennial contamination? Also, in our rush to digitize everything, have we forgotten that a computer is a computer is a computer? Food for thought.

Mutually Assured Disruption

Hello everyone- sorry for the lateness of this post. Blogger.com said that the site servers were down for maintenance so I gave up after tapping F5 very patiently for a few hours. I was going to talk about the recent viral infection the US Air Force experienced in one of their drone bases but in the hours since yesterday something much more interesting has happened:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/18/world/africa/cyber-warfare-against-libya-was-debated-by-us.html?hp

Cyberwarfare! The pinnacle of military computing. In the Naval Science class I must take for NROTC, the advanced Naval technology we are taught brings to mind Sun Tzu's famous maxim, "To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill". This occasion is unique- in the handful of times software (namely viruses) have been used as a weapon this is the first time it has been announced so candidly to the public. The issues at stake come surprisingly close to the issues that arose at the advent of nuclear weapons. There is a reluctance to use them for fear of escalation; because viruses as weapons are such unconventional forms of attack there is some guarantee of mutually assured destruction. In short, nobody wants to be the first one to open the can of worms that is cyberwarfare.  And not only has the command decision to pass up on digital weapons been made once, but twice. This brings into question just how big the threat of cyberwarfare is? As a destructive force it can disrupt enemy radar and shut down OpFor traffic control, but bearing in mind that congress recently passed a piece of legislation allowing for an executive 'kill-switch' for parts of the internet, how much of an impact will cyberwarfare have in civilian lives?

First Post- The Interface Gap

Good evening everyone, welcome to the first post of 'Computers and the Military'. While this might seem a particularly pan-optic topic for an expert blog, the array of technology at the military's disposal is vast and perennially being updated. The use of computing software in the military is of particular interest in the context of this IntroSem because cyberspace is an abstract location to wage war, and as such is often ethically and legally ambiguous. The most heavily reported cases are obvious: the use of drones to assassinate enemy combatants and US citizens, the use of high-tech surveillance equipment and satellites to monitor virtually anybody in the world. The bottom line is that this is a gargantuan amount of unchecked power. Without further ado, my first topic:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/17/technology/17brain.html?scp=5&sq=military%20computers&st=cse

This is a NYT article about how data on the battlefield is processed and delivered to remote drone operators. However, the system is somewhat 'too' effective, and the huge quantities of information delivered to operators results in 'information overload'. The human operators are unable to isolate the most valuable information (ie whether or not a gathering of people consists of any women or children) which results in misidentified targets and civilian deaths.

What seems to be the problem here is a gap in the human-machine interface, and following on from that, a gap in responsibility. To what extent is the death of a civilian the fault of a flawed computer system vs a human's ability to interpret the data? Would it be worse to give the software exclusive control? Moreover, the way in which we have interfaced with computers and their data has not changed a huge amount since the advent of the PC. Is this flaw in interpretation speak of a bigger problem in the way humans process data vs the way machines process data?