Pentagon Plan: Sky Internet for God's Eye View

[materia3]

http://www.periodistadigital.com/object.php?o=35524

Pentagon Envisioning a Costly Internet for War
[$200 billion]

By Tim Weiner
The New York Times (13/11/04, 10.08 horas)


The Pentagon is building its own Internet, the military’s world wide web for the wars of the future.

The goal is to give all American commanders and troops a moving picture of all foreign enemies and threats - "a God’s-eye view" of battle.

This "Internet in the sky," Peter Teets, under secretary of the Air Force, told Congress, would allow "marines in a Humvee, in a faraway land, in the middle of a rainstorm, to open up their laptops, request imagery" from a spy satellite, and "get it downloaded within seconds."

I guess it took 20 years for 1984 to arrive but if the above plan is implemented, what's to stop the penatgon from using the technology for more than tracking the enemy of the moment?

PS: Peter should consider changing his name.

 

[Ed]

Sounds like a good idea.

 

[Ladewig]

I guess it took 20 years for 1984 to arrive but if the above plan is implemented, what's to stop the penatgon from using the technology for more than tracking the enemy of the moment?

The highest resolution non-military satellites offer is about a 2-foot resolution (under ideal conditions). Even if the military is a factor of 10 ahead of that resolution, 2.5-inch resolution is not enough to individually identify people from above. Even if the government required license plates on top of your car, that level of resolution would require plates as big as your car to provide unique identifying numbers and even then driving into a parking garage would be enough to foil the satellite.

The cost of putting enough satellites over the United States to follow individuals would be prohibative, especially when the government knows that it could provide gigantic leverage for its intelligence community and military community by putting as many of these satellites as it could over the Middle East and other trouble areas.

If the government wants to track people, it will just put cameras on street corners, public transportion, airports, and a variety of other places. Facial recognition software for these types of cameras already exists.

Also, very few people take enough steps to hide themselves on the internet and the government could easily track postings back to a particular individual. Furthermore,....

I'll finish the post later, there's someone knocking on my door.

 

[varwoche]

Sounds like a good idea.

Does it trouble you that the government is amassing tools and policies that make a world like 1984 possible? Do you assume the people who run the government, now and in the future, will always respect the rule of law? Does loss of privacy (actual and potential) concern you?

Unrelated to this particular pentagon proposal, does it bother you that the government might pinpoint you as a suspected bad guy having data-mined what books you check out at the library and by reading your private email?

 

[Ed]

Does it trouble you that the government is amassing tools and policies that make a world like 1984 possible? Do you assume the people who run the government, now and in the future, will always respect the rule of law? Does loss of privacy (actual and potential) concern you?

Unrelated to this particular pentagon proposal, does it bother you that the government might pinpoint you as a suspected bad guy having data-mined what books you check out at the library and by reading your private email?

Technology will, in time provide real time monitering of everyone and what they do. Every transaction will be electronic so that laundering of mony or even reciept of mony for something bad will be immediately transparent.

These are the unavoidable ramifications of the technology that you are posting your Luddite ravings with.

The issue is not what or when but what we do with it all. Maybe everything should be thrown open to everyone, perhaps privacy is passe. You can't look at this with a 20th century perspective, that is as silly as calling 17th century people "racist", it is a non-sequitor.

 

[CFLarsen]

The goal is to give all American commanders and troops a moving picture of all foreign enemies and threats - "a God’s-eye view" of battle.

If the troops get it, then the enemy also gets it.

 

[Rob Lister]

If the troops get it, then the enemy also gets it.

Not necessarily so. Even 128 bit encryption is enough to foil the average enemy intercepts and would likely foil major enemy intercepts for at least several hours, if not days or weeks. And I doubt 128-bit encryption would be the standard.

Heck, for all I know they're already using quantum encryption, which is, in theory, not possible to crack. (though I don't think the practicality of the technology is quite up to 'in-the-field' snuff.

 

[geni]

Heck, for all I know they're already using quantum encryption, which is, in theory, not possible to crack. (though I don't think the practicality of the technology is quite up to 'in-the-field' snuff.

It is posible to crack. Just not in the way you would expect.

 

[varwoche]

Technology will, in time provide real time monitering of everyone and what they do. Every transaction will be electronic so that laundering of mony or even reciept of mony for something bad will be immediately transparent.

These are the unavoidable ramifications of the technology that you are posting your Luddite ravings with.

Yes, these are the ramifications I raise, you (unclear) insulting buffoon. I didn't even take a stand for or against the proposal. I'm not sure where I stand; better this than nuke the mid-east.

 

[DangerousBeliefs]

Just wait until we hook laser beams up to it.... frickin' laser beams!

MUH MUHHA MUHHHA MUH muhha ha

Unless you pay us 1 million dollars.

 

[Ed]

Yes, these are the ramifications I raise, you (unclear) insulting buffoon. I didn't even take a stand for or against the proposal. I'm not sure where I stand; better this than nuke the mid-east.

Well, if I am a buffoon I have come up in the world. Sorry for being abrupt. I just used the word "luddite" to my daughter so it was top of mind.

It will happen, all of this stuff. Hell, who needs a satallite when you can knock a GPS thing into a cell phone. Evidentially there are computers in many cars right now that capture all sorts of stuff in case of an accident and who knows about it.

Figure that 2004 era privacy will be gone. Maybe we evolve a society sorta Japanese, you know everything about folks but it is bad form to comment.

Claus, I have never heard of our IFF technology being compromised. I am sure that "THEY" can come up with something.

 

[Ed]

Just wait until we hook laser beams up to it.... frickin' laser beams!

MUH MUHHA MUHHHA MUH muhha ha

Unless you pay us 1 million dollars.

Jesus Christ Dr. Dangerous, the lasers themselves cost 10 million.

 

[Rob Lister]

It is posible to crack. Just not in the way you would expect.

Well, I stand corrected. There are always ways. The point is that the connection can be at least as secure as any other connection used/abused.

 

[evildave]

Sounds like they just want to move forward to make a reality of what JTIDS originally promised.

My experience with "Cutting Edge" military hardware is that it's always pretty crumby old junk. If it's something they will put in a soldier's hands in the future, by the time it gets there some open source shareware on a reliable PDA phone that you can buy for $40 will outperform it in every way, and probably be connected to a service that has better and more up-to-date data of most kinds other than troop deployments (i.e. GPS, topographical map, etc.) - except probably a random algorithm will have equivalent results telling the troops in the field what they need to know.

Naturally, once the paperwork and committees and pentagon get through with it, the military unit will cost $400,000 per unit, weigh 180 lbs (not including the bank of lead-acid batteries that are hard-mounted to a vehicle), and crash when you press the 'help' button. If it shipped today, it would be built entirely with electronics that were available in 1978, even if they had to pay someone to hand-make the antiquated parts (hence the mind-boggling price). When something goes wrong with a unit, it will take a year to get critical replacement parts.

 

[Bikewer]

Couldn't you just wear a hat?

 

[evildave]

Yes, a hat with a bright, distinctive pattern.

Seriously, the technology they're talking about is just a realtime database of dots with motion and labels. Someone, somewhere spots an enemy unit, and they radio in the particulars, and some guy adds it to the database, or updates a record. Presumably, a network's in place that is broadcasting the appropriate subset of the real-time data to people who need it.

Similarly our military units would have some form of transponder to report GPS location.

All in some suitably secure and encrypted fashion.

In other words, it would not be suitable for tracking individuals without other individuals following them around, unless they stuck a transponder on them.

All the satellites do is provide a global 'phone' connection for the system to communicate with. They're not to take pictures. They're to distribute data.

 

[CFLarsen]

Not necessarily so. Even 128 bit encryption is enough to foil the average enemy intercepts and would likely foil major enemy intercepts for at least several hours, if not days or weeks. And I doubt 128-bit encryption would be the standard.

Bang, dead soldier, got his equipment. No need to crack anything.

 

[PogoPedant]

Adding to CFLarsen's sentiment, I don't think anybody actually bothers to crack anything any more. It's much easier to steal a key.

 

[Matabiri]

This "Internet in the sky," Peter Teets, under secretary of the Air Force, told Congress, would allow "marines in a Humvee, in a faraway land, in the middle of a rainstorm, to open up their laptops, request imagery" from a spy satellite, and "get it downloaded within seconds."

... and see a satellite photo of a rainstorm?

Anyone know what useful data can be seen through this sort of weather? Thermal imaging? Radar images?

 

[Rob Lister]

Bang, dead soldier, got his equipment. No need to crack anything.

I suspect that isn't much of a problem. Session passwords, short connections, etc. Probably [could be] made a lot more secure than standard KIT/KY-xx communication equipment.