To understand what the future cyber threat may look like, people need to think outside-the-box to allow for a flow of new and interesting ideas. Threatcasting is a methodology that provides this opportunity for government, DOD, public, private, industry and academia to come together and brainstorm the different possible futures to help provide ways to mitigate and combat future threats.
In April, the Army Cyber Institute and 75th Innovation Command will host a Threatcasting Lab in which the premise of the future cyber threat is the assumption that China wins —establishing itself as the global hegemony and replacing western institutions, norms, law, and values with Chinese. For this exercise to be successful, having a diverse background of individuals to build relationships with one another is key.
“Threatcasting is one great way to build relationships and harness skills and talents that benefit our Army,” said Capt. Maxim Kovalsky, 75th IC cyber electromagnetic activities team. “It enables research partners from the 75th IC and ACI to not only research solutions for existing Army requirements but also to envision the future and help inform the Army what those requirements and priorities may be. Reservists bring with them their extended networks of contacts and relationships, which ensures that whole-of-society perspectives are represented as we envision the most pressing challenges to national security, and what solutions to those challenges might be.”
“Our relationship with the 75th IC is what makes this Threatcasting possible,” said Maj. Jessica Dawson, information warfare research lead at the Army Cyber Institute at West Point. “Capt. Kovalsky has led the effort to develop this Threatcasting with a keen eye toward an unexplored domain. Without his foresight and leadership, this effort would not have occurred.”
According to Dawson, while there are many thought experiments that look at a possible future conflict with China from military or economic domains, this Threatcasting Lab is focusing explicitly on information — in part because in the American national security structure, no one owns the I in DIME. Conversely, China has very deliberately employed the information domain to shift the narrative on COVID 19, for example, and to attempt to deter further investigations in the conditions of the Uyghurs in Xinjiang.
The topic of China and its meteoric rise to economic and political power came up several times in previous Threatcasting Labs, so it was a perfect theme to discuss for this event.
“I was immediately interested when I read the topic was on China’s Employment of Information in its Rise to Global Hegemony,” said Col. Clare O’Keeffe; she is a 75th IC CEMA officer and a United States Army Special Operations Command liaison officer who will bring her background and expertise to this Threatcasting Lab. “With this lab, I knew it would be a fun way to collaborate with subject matter experts from Universities and get a better understanding of the global Information Environment and how countries weaponize information.”
With 23 participants representing 13 organizations across DOD, academia, and industry in this virtual event, O’Keeffe believed it is “absolutely critical to get perspectives… This is like a mini form of crowd sourcing. In addition to understanding typical military threats, I think it is critical for to understand threats to our commercial industries, to our culture and governing principles.”
Other participants agreed on the importance of bringing multiple perspectives to the table to discuss how the future may look and how to work toward solving those problems before it becomes a reality.
“When it comes to the Future Operational Environment, General Murray has mandated my team explore ‘what could be’ in a dynamic and rapidly-changing world. In doing so, imagining a range of possible and plausible futures will continue to be a catalyst for innovation across the Army Modernization enterprise,” said Michael Dennis, chief of strategic futures at Army Futures Command and a participant in the Threatcasting Lab. He continued to explain why Threatcasting is important to his organization and our Army.
“As a member of Army Futures Command, I very much look forward to participating in the Threatcasting process with members of the Army Cyber Institute and 75th Innovation Command to learn more about the methodology and explore whether its elements can be adopted to our own FOE analysis as we continue to hunt strategic surprise,” Dennis said.
“China is very much a threat in the information space,” Dawson said.” The question for us is how do they deploy it to win and replace Western institutions and values with their own.” With this Threatcasting Lab, ACI and 75th IC hope to continue to build their working relationship, investigating innovations that will enable the Army face and defeat future threats.