September 13, 2023 | Local, Aerospace
Why did Trudeau's plane get stuck in India? It has to do with the purchase of new fighter jets.
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February 25, 2019 | Local, Aerospace
Canada bids for mothballed prototype drone from Germany
BERLIN (Reuters) - The German Defence Ministry is evaluating a bid from Canada to buy a high-altitude surveillance drone that has been parked at a German air base for years after the cancellation of the Euro Hawk program in 2013, with a further bid possible from NATO.
Canada has submitted a formal bid for the prototype aircraft, which was stripped of key equipment and demilitarized by the United States in 2017, a ministry spokesman said on Wednesday without providing further details.
Canadian media have reported that Canada could use the drone, built by Northrop Grumman, to monitor oil spills, ice levels and marine habitats in the remote Arctic region.
NATO, which is buying its own fleet of Northrop drones, is also considering a bid for the mothballed German aircraft but has not yet submitted it, said sources familiar with the process. NATO had no immediate comment.
There was no immediate reply from the Canadian government.
A sale of the drone would end an embarrassing chapter that raised concerns about the German military's procurement process and triggered the transfer of former Defence Minister Thomas de Maiziere to another cabinet post.
Berlin told lawmakers last year that it had spent about 700 million euros ($793.5 million) on the Euro Hawk prototype, and the ISIS surveillance system built by Airbus.
Berlin initiated plans in 2000 to buy five Euro Hawk drones based on Northrop's Global Hawk unmanned system at a cost of about 1.2 billion euros but later canceled the program because of cost overruns and problems obtaining certification for use in civilian airspace in Germany.
It had only received the one prototype aircraft that is now being sold.
Berlin is now negotiating with Northrop to buy several MQ-4C Triton drones for delivery after 2025. Northrop last year said the process could take years to complete.
German opposition lawmaker Andrej Hunko, a member of the radical Left party, said the government had declared the aircraft incapable of flight after the U.S. Air Force removed U.S. built radio equipment and other key systems when it demilitarized the aircraft in 2017.
“The airplane has salvage value at best,” he told Reuters.
“Any proceeds from the sale would be a drop in the bucket, compared with the huge amounts spent on the program.”
For NATO, the drone could provide additional support to the fleet of five high-altitude unmanned Global Hawk planes it agreed to buy from Northrop in 2012 for $1.7 billion, along with transportable ground stations.
Industry officials said the Euro Hawk saga underscored problems in military procurement, noting that NATO's sister aircraft regularly traverse German air space to conduct surveillance missions over the North Sea. They also have no blanket approval for use in German civilian airspace but use case-by-case permissions from air traffic authorities.
It was not immediately clear what steps would be needed to return the Euro Hawk prototype to flight.
Additional reporting by David Ljungren in Ottawa; Editing by Riham Alkousaa, David Goodman and William Maclean
https://www.kitco.com/news/2019-02-20/Canada-bids-for-mothballed-prototype-drone-from-Germany.html
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December 26, 2022 | Local, Aerospace
Remplacement d’avions de surveillance | Un contrat de plusieurs milliards intéresse Bombardier et Boeing
Un contrat multimilliardaire d’avions de surveillance pour les Forces armées canadiennes se profile et intéresse deux rivaux qui se connaissent bien : Bombardier et Boeing. Le premier tente d’accroître son exposition au secteur militaire et l’autre aimerait revenir dans les bonnes grâces d’Ottawa.
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March 17, 2020 | Local, C4ISR, Security
Online 'phishing' attacks expected to target housebound staffers as COVID-19 spreads
It's a 'huge opportunity' for online crime, one expert warns The number of "phishing" attacks meant to steal the online credentials of public servants and corporate sector employees now housebound due to the COVID-19 pandemic is on the rise, one cyber security expert warns. Many attempts are being made against employees who are working from home on virtual private works (VPNs). Cyber experts are still gathering data to establish a direct correlation between the pandemic crisis and the increase in malicious activity. But Rafal Rohozinski, chief executive officer of the SecDev Group of Companies, said this pandemic moment — when large numbers of employees are at home and receiving instructions from their workplaces on how to connect to internal networks — offers online thieves a "huge opportunity." Federal government and corporate sector systems were never designed to support a sudden, mass migration of employees from offices to their homes, he said. "The opening that creates for those who want to wreak havoc through ransomware and malware is really, really significant," said Rohozinski. "And I don't think we're anywhere near prepared for that. "What we're seeing is an increase in phishing being used as a means to get people's credentials." U.S. Health Department attacked The U.S. Health and Human Services Department's website was hit by a cyber attack over several hours on Sunday, an incident which involved overloading its servers with millions of hits. Officials said the system was not penetrated, although media reports in Washington described it as an attempt to undermine the U.S. government's response to the coronavirus pandemic — and may have been the work of a foreign actor. Rohozinski said that while the facts are not all in yet, his "professional guess" is that there's a link between the attack and the COVID-19 crisis. Last week, Canada's top military commander warned that he'd seen recent indications the country's adversaries intend to exploit the uncertainty, confusion and fear generated by the pandemic. Send in the trolls: Canada braces for an online disinformation assault on COVID-19 Gen. Jonathan Vance, chief of the defence staff, was not specific about the potential threats — but experts say they could range from hacking to online disinformation campaigns aimed at discrediting the federal government's response. Rohozinski said he's concerned about the federal government's technical capacity to support thousands of employees on private networks. "Everybody's moving on to VPNs. Everybody," he said. "This is an enormous pinpoint and an enormous vulnerability." Federal Digital Government Minister Joyce Murray's office was asked for a response Monday, but was unable to provide an immediate comment. Many of the country's leading information technology companies are part of the Canadian Cyber Threat Exchange (CCTE), a nonprofit centre where companies can swap information and insights. A CCTE spokeswoman said the corporate sector is better prepared to face the challenges posed by the mass movement of employees to home networks. Canada to bar entry to travellers who are not citizens, permanent residents or Americans Canadian military bans international travel in response to COVID-19 Still, there is reason for concern. "Given we are moving people to work from home now, companies need to ensure that the work from home environment is as safe as the corporate environment and that people are trained to notice these phishing campaigns, just like they were in the corporate environment," said Mary Jane Couldridge, director of business development at the CCTE. "It's a matter of keeping our community aware of what is impacting Canada daily so we know how to react to it and prevent it from spreading — and not chase rainbows." Most corporations have plans they'll activate now to cover the wholesale movement of employees to networks outside of the office, she added. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/online-hacking-phishing-covid-19-coronavirus-1.5499725