Understanding a Space Called Cyber
There is no doubt that many people have difficulty grappling with the idea of cyber space, cyber security, information security and many other terms proliferating through the media and public policy. Part of it is because the ‘virtual’ label makes it seem so intangible, and hard to touch. Those who try to communicate the seriousness of the threat have difficulty in making it seem real and present. Part of the problem is also because the subject doesn’t seem to conform to any traditional organisation that one would expect in a higher education institution or professional interest group. When one opens a discussion on security with an engineer, it is not long before one needs to get a psychologist in the room too, and not just because one is talking to an engineer. Rather, security is a problem that must work across disciplines and bring an understanding of technology and behaviour together. Presenting a coherent whole across disciplines is difficult for any one person or group.
Some have tried to depict cyberspace as having a number of layers comprising the social, people, persona, information, data, network and physical layers. I prefer to think of them as dimensions, as they are not so easily separated in layers and are much more interconnected. The diagram below provides a graphical representation of cyber space.
For me, these dimensions raise a number of large real world questions (giving a lie to the ‘virtual) that we are trying to tackle in our multi-disciplinary teaching and research at Cranfield Defence and Security
For me, these dimensions raise a number of large real world questions (giving a lie to the ‘virtual) that we are trying to tackle in our multi-disciplinary teaching and research at Cranfield Defence and Security.
The people dimension Why do people behave as they do?
Understanding the motivations and drivers of people is a critical element of any criminal investigation or security cultural and behavioural change programme. Why people are motivated to attack systems, adopt certain technologies or act securely are questions of particular interest.
The persona dimension Who is who and how do we know?
People online can have multiple personas. @John is not the same as John the person, who could just as easily be @fred. How can we really know who is who? How do we build trust between people, and between people and businesses online? How easy is it to show that an event on the internet is associated with a particular person in a particular place, good enough to stand scrutiny in court?
The information dimension How is data and information used and exploited?
Information is an asset. It has value for scientists, health administrators, students, consumers companies, marketers and intelligence analysts. It also has a value to criminals and spies. Cranfield is interested in how information is valued, managed and exploited. We are interested in how data becomes information and knowledge, and how it is visualised and processed to create new knowledge.
The network dimension How do I keep my networks, systems and services secure and resilient?
The connectivity supplied by infrastructure allows us to communicate, store, process information and to control processes in critical places such as power plants and transport systems. Keeping them secure and online at a time when more distributed architectures such as cloud computing are implemented is of critical importance for study and research.
The physical world How does the virtual world affect the physical world and vice versa?
The other dimensions should not be seen separately – people work with networked technology to provide services for other people. One cannot either separate the physical world from the virtual world. In one sense the information infrastructure runs on real kit in real places in real jurisdictions (as well as space). In another the impact of a discussion on one forum can play out in a city centre.
Together these dimensions and challenges for research and teaching point towards a set of real world problems that we at Cranfield are addressing by bringing technicians, engineers and social scientist together.
