Tag Archive for: Army

Army trains personnel in cyber-warfare

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The Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Taoreed Lagbaja, says the Nigerian Army has acquired electronic warfare capabilities and is now taking advantage of the convergence of electronic and cyber warfare.

Lagbaja said this on Monday in Abuja, at the opening of the Maiden Cyber Security Workshop of the Nigerian Army Cyber Warfare School.

The News Agency of Nigeria reports that the theme of the workshop was “Role of Information Technology in National Security against Upcoming Threats and Cyber-attacks.”

Represented by the Deputy Director-General, Nigerian Army Heritage and Future Centre, Maj. Gen. Sanusi Dahiru, the COAS noted increasing cyber threats to national assets and called on the participants at the training to “use this singular opportunity to learn as much as you can, open up new vistas and perspectives so that we can achieve landmark results for the army and the nation at large.”

He said, “The workshop should not only focus on cybersecurity but should include cyber warfare, as this will equip the Nigerian Army with expertise and knowledge of integrating cybersecurity into military doctrine and tactics as well as exploring the role of cyber warfare in contemporary military operations.”

Lagbaja said that cyber threats could come from many sources, including foreign organisations, hacktivists, governments, groups, criminals as well as individuals, adding that cyber-attacks were increasingly targeting critical infrastructure such as power grids, financial systems, health care organisations and government networks.

“It is for this reason that the Nigerian Army Cyber Warfare Command and NACWS were established to curb the threats posed by this domain.

“We therefore need to rally around to ensure this initiative is effective and efficient, besides the need to protect the huge investments made so far.

“I am particularly pleased with the drive of the school in using its tools not only as a means of academic excellence but as a viable means of proffering solutions to contemporary and future security challenges which is in line with the sustainment of my command philosophy for the Nigerian Army,” Lagbaja added.

He thanked President Bola Tinubu…

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Army cyber officials want to harness AI, but not over-hype

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Paul Stanton

U.S. Army Cyber Center of Excellence and Fort Gordon Commanding General, Maj. Gen. Paul Stanton, welcomes attendees to AFCEA’s TechNet Augusta 2022 at the Augusta Marriott Convention Center in Augusta, Georgia, on August 16th, 2022. (Photo by Capt. Rebecca Harr)

AFCEA AUGUSTA 2023 — Army cyber leaders want to harness the potential of artificial intelligence for a role in future operations, but are trying to balance excitement about the capabilities with caution not to get hopes up on how soon it can make a real difference.

Speaking to reporters Aug. 17 at the AFCEA TechNet Augusta conference, officials said the service is actively exploring ways AI can be used in offensive operations against its networks, while service coders are looking at how it can also benefit them. 

“But we’re not developing someone that understands how to write code — what we are developing is someone that understands that artificial intelligence is predicated on the aggregation of a lot of data,” Maj. Gen. Paul Stanton, commander of the Cyber Center of Excellence (CCoE), said. 

“And so, separately, within our cyber workforce and specifically coordination with Army Cyber Command, we’re thinking a lot about what does it mean to develop confidence and an externally derived dataset upon which an AI algorithm is run,” he added. “So if I’m pulling in data from lots of different places, what degree of confidence do I have in individual data set that I didn’t generate?”

The CCoE is currently running a pilot program with Army Futures Command on how large language models can support doctrine-based research, he added. 

“So if a soldier wants to ask a ChatGPT-like question that says, you know, ‘How do I execute a doctrinally correct wet gap crossing?,’ then you would get back an answer, because the large language model had surveyed all of our doctrine in order to support an informed response,” he said. “We’re in the early stages of it. But my point is we’re not sitting on the sidelines and watching, we’re diving in.”

He said that at least one member of every center of excellence has been tasked by Lt. Gen. Milford Beagle from the Combined Arms Center to attend a…

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Army struggling to hire cyber staff as attacks on Britain ramp up

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The Army is struggling to hire cyber security experts amid intense competition from business, its recruitment chief has admitted.

Richard Holroyd, managing director of Defence and Security at Capita, which handles recruitment for the Armed Forces, said it was having difficulty attracting candidates given the wealth of jobs on offer.

He told the Telegraph: “You’re saying to people with an interest in it, come and be a cyber specialist in the armed forces, but Raytheon is saying come and be a cyber specialist, BT are saying come and be a cyber specialist. So in those spaces, you’re competing.

“In a labour market with full employment it’s a tough, tough play.”

Mr Holroyd said Capita was on track to only meet 80pc of its Army recruitment target this year, in part because of difficulties filling technical roles.

He said: “Anything related to STEM [science, technology, engineering and mathematics] is a highly competitive environment. So STEM skills are tough.”

Capita’s exact target wasn’t given and the Ministry of Defence declined to comment on it.

The admission comes despite the increasing importance of cyber for both offensive and defensive capabilities.

The Minister of Defence said last month there was an “urgent requirement to continue to modernise the force to keep pace with technological developments”.

Boosting the digital skills is a “matter of priority” over the next three years, officials wrote in the Defence Command paper.

Mr Holroyd said cyber security experts have “much more choice” than in previous years and admitted that private sector companies have proven faster at recruiting, sometimes making offers within a few weeks.

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Army taps Lockheed for second phase of long-range EW, surveillance program

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Land Warfare, Networks / Cyber

Silhouette Electronic Warfare

U.S. Army Soldiers assigned to “Wild Bill” Platoon, 1st Squadron, 7th Cavalry Regiment and 1st Battalion, 4th Infantry Regiment conduct electronic warfare training during Combined Resolve XV, Feb. 23, 2021 at the Hohenfels Training Area. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Julian Padua)

WASHINGTON — Lockheed Martin will move onto the second phase of building out a prototype meant to provide formations larger than the brigade level with longer-range electronic warfare (EW) systems and situational awareness capabilities, beating out competitor General Dynamics Missions Systems (GDMS.) 

Under the contract, announced Tuesday by the Army, Lockheed will take its Terrestrial Layer System-Echelons Above Brigade (TLS-EAB) prototype from “design and lab-based demonstrations to a tangible form factor able to be tested in a relevant environment,” Lt. Col. Kris Haley, product manager for terrestrial spectrum warfare said. The award is worth up to $36.7 million for a 21-month period of performance. 

“The TLS-EAB is an extended-range, terrestrial sensing, collection, and electronic attack system providing integrated [signals intelligence], EW and cyber capabilities for situational awareness, situational understanding, Intelligence & Warning, command post survivability, critical asset protection operations, and supports the delivery of lethal and non-lethal effects in a holistic, synchronized manner for Multi-Domain Operations (MDO),” according to the announcement. Translation: It’s meant to better let commanders know the various threats they’re facing at a greater distance.

Lockheed will build the prototype TLS-EAB system at its facility in Syracuse, NY, “in the coming months,” according to a company press release. During the first phase of TLS-EAB development, both Lockheed and GDMS conducted “soldier touch points” to take feedback and incorporate it into their design phase. 

“Moving into this next phase, we are going to continue to embrace Soldier Touch Points to drive the design while leveraging a proven DevSecOps pipeline and an open architecture that will enable a highly interoperable, configurable 21st Century Security…

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