Monday, March 22, 2010

Pavel, military strategist, to discuss "Military Force Planning and Decision Making,"


Barry Pavel, M.P.A. '90, M.A. '92, senior director of defense policy at the National Security Council, will present a public talk titled, "Military Force Planning and Decision Making" on Monday, March 22 at 4:30 p.m. in Dodds Auditorium, Robertson Hall on the Princeton University campus.

Pavel oversees an array of strategy, force assessment, and long-range policy planning analyses, including the defense component of the U.S. National Security Strategy. He assists the in the development of policy regarding the capabilities and operational employment of special operations forces, strategic forces and conventional forces. He also assists on counterterrorism strategy, irregular warfare and force transformation. His recent main areas of work include policy oversight for strategic capability matters (including development of a cyber deterrence policy and better aligning the Department's approach to cyber activities and capabilities with defense strategy and policy) and Global War on Terrorism policy. Pavel has led or contributed to a broad range of defense strategy and planning initiatives over the last decade. He played a leading role in the organization and conduct of the 2001 Quadrennial Defense Review. He also was a leading contributor and drafter of the 2005 U.S. National Defense Strategy and was a key architect of the ongoing U.S. global defense posture realignment. Pavel also serves as a Department of Defense representative in the interagency process and to foreign officials and the public.

Monday, March 8, 2010

Tokyo’s Cyber Emergency Centre at the vanguard of hacking defence - Times Online

Tokyo’s Cyber Emergency Centre at the vanguard of hacking defence - Times Online

Tokyo’s Cyber Emergency Centre at the vanguard of hacking defence

Across one wall of a Thunderbirds-style command centre a huge map of the world keeps a running log of global cyber-attacks. Bloodcurdling names dart across the screen as thousands of computers are attacked in Houston or Hiroshima or Hampstead. This is Tokyo’s Cyber Emergency Centre.

Itsuro Nishimoto gives an order to one of his staff, who hacks a nearby laptop. In less than a minute he can observe the person working at that computer using the laptop’s webcam. The operating light has been disabled; the user has no idea he can be seen.

“The cyber-attacker will tend to watch and wait until the user goes to the bathroom or to get a cup of coffee,” says Mr Nishimoto, “then the real assault begins. People talk about cyberwar as if it hasn’t already begun. It has. It has all the characters of real wars: attackers, defenders, innocent victims, fearsome weapons. Even mercenaries.”