Where Cyber Meets the Electromagnetic Spectrum

Abstract

Cyber linked with Information Technology, computers and the internet are the most commonly understood potential threats that everybody is aware of nowadays. In the case of National Cyber Strategy most efforts are given to these potential battlefields and threats. But is it enough to stay with these paradigms? Cyber warfare will look for utmost effects for chaos and misalignment of economy and therefore we cannot exclude the facts, that there is a potential threat also possible in the cut volumes between the information technology, the electromagnetic spectrum and its linked infrastructure and processes. We understand the technology for mobile telecommunications and data transfer, as the providers and linked business models are transparent and an open source and therefore a potential threat in the sense of cyber-attacks. All these services are based on the message transfer in the Electromagnetic Spectrum (EMS). It will be more challenging to enter in secured networks and modern data communication protected by encrypted and secured data links, hardened equipment and architecture. But as those systems, like the avionics and communication subsystems in airborne vehicles and commercial aircrafts are highly interlinked and interoperable based on data networks, it will be necessary to understand the architecture and weaknesses in detail. Of course, these principles are not fixed only to the airborne platforms and relevant applications; you may find the same technical pandemics in data transmission and data engineering in the physics of any data transfer chain, like satellite communication, radio transmission links. The paper will discuss the technical background in principle and identify potential weaknesses in aviation electromagnetic spectrum. We propose measures for attention and the implementation of relevant procedures and quality in order to overcome bottlenecks and grey area dull which helps the opponents to weaken society and open a sideshow for conflicts introduced by “simple cyber threat handling”. © 2019, Curran Associates Inc. All rights reserved.