Lynn: Cyberspace Strategy to Build Coalition of Nations

By Cheryl Pellerin

American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, May 16, 2011 – White House officials released an international cyberstrategy here today that will help to build a “coalition of nations [with a] mutual interest in securing cyberspace,” Deputy Defense Secretary William J. Lynn III said.

The event to launch the U.S. International Strategy for Cyberspace also included remarks by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., Commerce Secretary Gary Locke and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano.

“The strategy the president is releasing today provides a framework for how we can expand this cooperation and establishes how network security relates to other critical areas of partnership,” Lynn said.

Hosting the event were John O. Brennan, assistant to the president for counterterrorism and homeland security, and Howard A. Schmidt, special assistant to the president and cybersecurity coordinator.

Senior foreign diplomats and representatives from industry, civil society and academia also attended.

Clinton said the strategy’s seven key policy priorities are economic engagement, cybersecurity, law enforcement, military cooperation, multiple-stakeholder Internet governance, development and Internet freedom.

“We are seeing cyberspace transform before our very eyes,” she said. “Now we must shape this transformation.”

White House officials released a statement that called the strategy a “first-of-its-kind policy document [that] offers our comprehensive vision for the future of international cooperation in cyberspace.” The report also outlines the administration’s agenda, the statement said, “for partnering with other nations and peoples to ensure the prosperity, security and openness that we seek in our increasingly networked world.”

Lynn said no one nation can devise or enforce a sustainable solution.

“It is hard to overstate the importance of cyberspace to the Department of Defense or the need to engage our allies and partners to keep it secure,” he said. “Department of Defense networks are probed millions of times a day, and more than 100 foreign intelligence agencies have tried to penetrate our networks or those of our industrial partners.”

Cyber threats are growing more serious and more prevalent, Lynn added, and meeting them requires the cooperation of nations, the private sector and individuals.

“Our military continues to ensure that we can operate with secure and reliable networks, he said, “and maintain the capability to defend vital national assets.”

The Defense Department’s forthcoming Strategy for Operating in Cyberspace, Lynn said, will detail the military’s role in keeping DOD networks secure.

“Just as our air defenses are linked with those of our allies to provide warning of attack, so too must we share information to prevent and, if necessary, respond to cyber intrusions,” he added.

Over the past year, DOD officials have worked with counterparts in Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the NATO alliance to strengthen cyber partnerships, Lynn said.

“While our efforts are increasingly linked with many international partners,” he added, “far greater levels of cooperation with more nations are needed if we are to stay ahead of the cyber threat.”

The strategy that President Barack Obama released today, Lynn said, “provides a framework for how we can expand this cooperation and establishes how network security relates to other crucial areas of partnership.”

Lynn said he is delighted to carry defense cooperation forward in the cyber realm.

“I look forward to working closely in this effort with the departments of State, Justice, Commerce and Homeland Security under the leadership of President Obama,” he said.

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Virtual Worlds Form Defense Training Frontier

By Cheryl Pellerin

American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, May 9, 2011 – Five years from now, if Frank C. DiGiovanni has his way, warfighters from every service will learn aspects of their trade on a world in cyberspace.

The Defense Department will save money, time, and ultimately, lives, he said, and it’s his job to make that virtual world a reality.

DiGiovanni is director of training readiness and strategy in the office of the deputy assistant secretary of defense for readiness. He’s also a retired Air Force colonel and a senior aviator.

“I’d love to see it happen in the next 18 months to two years,” DiGiovanni said in an interview with American Forces Press Service. “Realistically, a full-up world is probably five years away.”

Over the next five years, the Defense Department will build that world in cyberspace, where the men and women of the armed forces will take another step forward in the transition from analog to digital technology that began with the public Internet and DOD websites.

A virtual world is a computer-based simulated environment that’s available 24 hours a day. Users create digital representations of themselves, called “avatars,” that build out the world, creating content and communicating with each other.

Second Life is one of many virtual worlds that exist in cyberspace. It opened in 2003, created by Linden Lab, a San Francisco-based company founded in 1999 by Philip Rosedale to create a new form of shared experience.

Second Life residents -- 20 million and rising, from hundreds of countries -- build and own the world’s digital infrastructure. This includes homes, vehicles, campuses of real-life universities, museums, nightclubs, stores, libraries, landscapes, games, islands, companies, government organizations and military bases.

A handful of U.S. government agencies have facilities of varying complexity and interaction in Second Life.

These include NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the National Institutes of Health and its National Library of Medicine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Department of Homeland Security, the House of Representatives and more every day.

The Defense Department’s virtual world may be five years away, but the Army, Navy and Air Force all have public and private facilities in Second Life, and in other virtual worlds, including Teleplace and OpenSimulator.

In Second Life, U.S. military activities take place on a growing collection of islands called “Military Islands.”

MiLands was established in 2008 by Doug Maxwell, formerly of the Naval Undersea Warfare Center and now science and technology manager for virtual world and strategic applications at the Army Simulation and Training Technology Center in Orlando, Fla. MiLands includes the Air Force Air Education and Training Command and Air University, the Naval Undersea Warfare Command and other Navy projects, a Marine Corps island, several Army groups and Coalition Island, a military hub.

Each group uses Second Life for activities that include training, education, collaboration and research.

DiGiovanni praises these efforts as “pioneering work done by the services and some people with great vision who really saw the potential” of virtual worlds for military uses.

“But we felt it was ad hoc,” DiGiovanni said.

For the DOD virtual world experts are working on “a governance model that makes sense” in which everyone in the world can participate, DiGiovanni said, much like the Constitution allows American citizens to participate in their government.

“A governance model allows you to take all the efforts that are going on and synchronize them, integrate them, so you have a comprehensive whole, and not four separate efforts,” he added.

“I don’t want four separate worlds, I want one world … to be able to leverage all that content building that’s being done by everyone out there,” the director said.

DiGiovanni began thinking about emerging technologies when he was asked to develop a training environment that was available globally, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Some of the inspiration for virtual world military training came from massively multiplayer online games, such as Halo and Call of Duty, he said.

“When you look at the ability to go to an online game, pick a team ad hoc, decide on the tactic and then start the game,” DiGiovanni added, “that’s when you think, if we can do that in the commercial world, the Defense Department needs a similar capability.”

A “perfect storm” of resource constraints, global repositioning of troops coming home from the Middle East, and competing demands for land, air and maritime training capability makes it critical to develop a virtual training capability, he said.

Such an environment, DiGiovanni said, must be “augmented with some type of physical training to make sure that what you’re learning in the virtual world can be exported to the real world.”

Virtual training can be very effective, he added, and can help people become much more proficient in the limited amount of time and space available with live resources.

The Strategic Plan for the Next Generation of Training for the Department of Defense, published in 2010, DiGiovanni said, discusses “leveraging emerging technologies to enhance our training capabilities.”

The plan was fully vetted across all four services and signed by Deputy Defense Secretary William J. Lynn III, he added.

Essential features of a technology-based training environment, the report says, include synchronizing “live and virtual training operations in near-real time to enable realistic simulation of sensors, replication of visual cues and platform interactions [among] live, virtual and constructive participants.”

DiGiovanni and his staff meet with industry experts and consult regularly with the technological pioneers who are building virtual capacity today for the military services.

Carl Rosengrant, senior technical adviser for training readiness and strategy, said his office would soon receive the results of a study by industry experts to help DOD define the framework and tools needed to develop the Defense Department online world.

When the report is written and vetted with technology experts in the military services, DiGiovanni said, “We think we’ll be able to put the construct together that would allow us to build a world.”

American culture is well postured to lead a revolution in the use of the virtual training environment, DiGiovanni said.

“I challenge everyone to put their pioneering spirit on,” he said, “think about where technology can take us, and then let’s go there together.”

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