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  16 juillet 2019 | International, Aérospatial, Autre défense

  New Army cyber gear for drones and teams test, protect units in another domain

  By: Todd South A prototype device used recently at the Army's premiere combat training center has soldiers using precision cyber techniques to target small drones that might have been missed with other equipment and methods. Soldiers with the 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division used the cyber precision drone detection system during a January rotation at the National Training Center. The equipment allowed soldiers to get alerts of drone presence and ways to target it that helped protect the brigade, according to an Army release. Capt. Christopher Packard said the prototype integrated with existing signal, intelligence and electronic warfare capabilities. Five soldiers embedded with the opposing force to attack the brigade with enemy drones for more realistic training, according to the release. A group of software developers at the Army's Cyber Command along with others at the Defense Digital Service built custom software and modified commercial equipment to make the early versions of the prototype last year. “The (Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office) and Tobyhanna (Army Depot) helped out with taking it from an advanced prototype and turning it into an engineering design model,” said 1st Lt. Aneesh Patel, with ARCYBER's Cyber Solutions Development Detachment with the 782nd Military Intelligence Battalion, 780th Military Intelligence Brigade. “We designed our own hardware and schematics, but what we didn't have was the proper ability to scale, and I think that's important in a bridging strategy and for any prototype.” The system is an “interim solution,” according to the release. “Being a newer system and a new tool for a maneuver unit, there are going to be a lot of things we don't know as [cyber] engineers, and a lot of their specific needs for the capability that may not have gotten through to us. So being out there was very important to this and any other project like it,” Patel said. The system will be followed by an upgraded version slated for Special Operations Command for an operational assessment this summer. Phase two will maximize the capability's operational life span by adding software updates that improve performance, according to the release. That type of equipment hits drones, but the Army also has its own cyber protection teams, such as the one featured in another release out of Grafenwoehr, Germany in June, where the 301st and 172nd CPTs used defensive measures for the Sabre Guardian 19 exercise. The annual exercise is taking place this year in Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania, co-led by the Romanian Joint Force Command. The teams “create chaos by accessing the network and either disabling it or stealing classified information and using it against the units involved in the exercise.” Though cyber threats have been a talking point among commanders for years, it wasn't until this most recent rotation that cyber threats were simulated for the exercise, said Capt. Joe McNerney, 301st CPT battle captain. The captain explained that the CPTs simulate an insider threat. The 172nd is a combination of soldiers and airmen from units based in Indiana, Michigan and Ohio. The 301st is an Air Force unit out of the Battle Creek Air National Guard Base, Michigan. “They're people we work with on a daily basis so we want to beat them," said Sgt. Brian Stevens, an information technology specialist from Detroit. “We have to make them feel pain at some level.” https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2019/07/15/new-army-cyber-gear-for-drones-and-teams-test-protect-units-in-another-domain/

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  16 février 2018 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, C4ISR

  LEONARDO TO LEAD OCEAN2020 PROGRAM, THE FIRST AND MOST IMPORTANT EUROPEAN DEFENCE AGENCY RESEARCH TENDER FOR NAVAL SURVEILLANCE TECHNOLOGY

  OCEAN2020, a European Defence Fund initiative, will boost technological research in the naval domain also by the integration of unmanned platforms in surveillance and interdiction missions Leonardo is a leader in systems integration and will lead a team of 42 partner companies including Saab, Safran, PGZ and MBDA, research bodies such as NATO CMRE and the defence ministries of five countries The first operational demonstration will take place in 2019 in the Mediterranean Sea. The demo will involve Leonardo's ‘Hero' and ‘Solo' unmanned helicopters, naval vessels and systems from a number of partners, including Italian Navy's vessels equipped with Leonardo's systems Leonardo was awarded the most important project related to the first European Defence Found's initiative, OCEAN2020, to boost Europe's defence capabilities, issued by the European Union under the ‘Preparatory Action on Defence Research' programme. The competitive selection was conducted by the European Defence Agency and will be contracted in the coming weeks. The OCEAN2020 team, which will be led by Leonardo, comprises 42 partners from 15 European countries. These include the Ministries of Defence of Italy, Greece, Spain, Portugal and Lithuania, with additional support from the Ministries of Defence of Sweden, France, the United Kingdom and Estonia and the Netherlands. European industrial partners include Indra, Safran, Saab, MBDA, PGZ/CTM, Hensoldt, Intracom-IDE, Fincantieri and QinetiQ. A number of research centres include Fraunhofer, TNO, CMRE (NATO) and IAI. “We are extremely pleased with this result, the OCEAN2020 initiative has a high level of strategic and technological-operational value” said Alessandro Profumo, CEO of Leonardo. “It is the leading technological research project dedicated to the very topical issue of maritime surveillance, which is of interest across Europe and to the Mediterranean region in particular. This success has been made possible thanks to the strong collaboration between all 42 team partners which we have the honour to lead.” OCEAN2020 is the first example of a cross-European military research programme to-date. The Leonardo-led bid required a thorough analysis of operational requirements and a technologically-innovative yet operationally-realistic proposal. The research project also will see the integration of unmanned platforms in surveillance and interdiction missions. The success in winning the tender both highlights, and will enhance, Leonardo's strength in naval products and integrated systems. The company's expertise in the domain includes command and control systems, unmanned aircraft, sensors, helicopters for naval applications, communications and weapon systems, on the surface and underwater. OCEAN2020 will see unmanned platforms of different type (fixed wing, rotary wing, surface and underwater) integrated with naval units' command and control centres, allowing for data exchange via satellite, with command and control centres on land. The joint and cooperative use of both manned and unmanned vehicles will also be demonstrated as part of the project. Leonardo would like to thank the Italian Navy which, as a key OCEAN2020 partner, has and will continue to make important contributions to the project. This includes the development of operational scenarios and making available naval assets and helicopters, which will take part in demonstrations. In addition to complex simulation work, OCEAN2020 project will involve two live demonstrations of maritime surveillance and interdiction operations, conducted by European fleets using unmanned aircraft, surface vessels and underwater systems. The first demo, scheduled to take place in the Mediterranean Sea in 2019, will be coordinated by the Italian Navy and will see Leonardo's ‘Hero' and ‘Solo' unmanned helicopters operate from Italian naval units alongside other European partners. The second demonstration, which will take place in 2020 in the Baltic Sea, will be coordinated by the Swedish Navy. The data collected by various systems during these two demos will be processed and sent to a prototype European command and control centre in Brussels. http://www.leonardocompany.com/en/-/ocean-2020

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  8 mai 2019 | International, Terrestre, C4ISR

  The Army looks to build up its cyber arsenal

  By: Mark Pomerleau The Army is building a new tactical cyber force and it's going to need an arsenal. Immediately stocking one is another story, however, because “offensive cyber” tools are currently developed and owned by U.S. Cyber Command for the joint mission, so the Army is working on how to best equip its teams' specific needs. The Army's 915th Cyber Warfare Support Battalion (CWSB) will be capable of conducting localized cyber effects through the electromagnetic spectrum, rather than the IP-based operations conducted by Cyber Command, though it might have a tie-in with these forces and capabilities. The CWSB will operate as an Army Cyber Command asset. It will live at the division level with 12 expeditionary cyber teams, each consisting of 45-person detachment-sized elements that will be in support of brigade combat teams and arrayed over that brigade's battlespace on the ground. They will likely operate alongside companies. In order to prepare these new cyber teams, the Army will have to work through the Joint Cyber Warfighter Architecture (JCWA), a singular approach to tools and platforms for high-end, remote cyber operators established by Cyber Command. “By defining that architecture, then Cyber Command encourages the service cyber components with their acquisition entities to propose capabilities that would meet that architecture,” Ronald Pontius, deputy to the commanding general at Army Cyber Command, told Fifth Domain on the sidelines of an industry conference May 1. “Cyber Command should lead the architecture and standards, then they should be looking to the services to actually build the capability.” The JCWA is intended to guide capability development across all the services, as Cyber Command doesn't want capabilities designed and used by one service. How that translates into equipping these Army-specific entities requires working out “synergies” between that tactical force and the larger force, so determining what common and custom tools the CWSB uses will be in concert with the joint Cyber Command forces. “It all has to be integrated from top to bottom,” Kenneth Strayer, deputy program manager for electronic warfare and cyber at Program Executive Office-Intelligence, Electronic Warfare and Sensors, told Fifth Domain. “All the way from sanctuary through developing capabilities to delivering capabilities. This all has to be integrated and it's all nested on Cyber Command and ARCYBER, [which] is a component, and the tactical units are all nested under ARCYBER.” Strayer added that he wouldn't separate them, but obviously the needed capabilities will be different depending on the placement of units, either in the close fight on the ground or in remote sanctuary. Questions Army Cyber Command leaders will have to wrestle with regarding using tools from the joint force at the tactical level include what infrastructure forces will operate on, and whether the tool will be attributable or not. Pontius said generally tools should be 100-percent attributable in the tactical space [letting victims know the United States is attacking them as a deterrent of further action], while that is not always the case in the joint environment. Having the CWSB in Army Cyber Command and not distributed throughout the service, he added, aids in answering these questions, optimizing tool development, and keeping the force trained and certified much more efficiently than if members of this force were spread out across different Army entities. One way the Army is potentially benefiting the CWSB separate from the joint mission is a recent $1 billion contract for research and development work in support of the cyber mission. Contractors awarded are tasked with providing research into cyber and electromagnetic activities (CEMA) capabilities. The contract currently is not asking for any materiel development. https://www.fifthdomain.com/dod/army/2019/05/06/the-army-looks-to-build-up-its-cyber-arsenal/