Advances in information technology are heavily influencing ways in which business, society, and government work and function throughout the globe, bringing many changes to everyday life, in a process commonly termed the "information revolution." This book paints a picture of the state of the information revolution today and how it will likely progress in the near- to mid-term future (10 to 15 years), focusing separately on different regions of the world-North America, Europe, the Asia-Pacific region, Latin America, the Middle East and North Africa, and sub-Saharan Africa.
Reports on a conference sponsored by the National Intelligence Council in May 2000 that concentrated on technical trends in the information revolution, focusing in particular on the resulting new artifacts and services that might become widespread during the next 20 years. Participants saw a convergence of voice and data communications and a quantum jump in bandwidth during the next two decades, along with limited machine translation. A multitude of diverse, powerful, inexpensive sensors and devices capable of limited-distance wireless communications will come onto the market and computing and information systems will become much more ubiquitous, with convergence of wireless telephones, voice and e-mail messaging, and smart appliances. A likely shift in business emphasis from products to services will have an impact in such areas as health care, education, entertainment, and supply-chain management. Participants also discussed individual and societal tensions that could arise from these developments, such as battles between advocates of "open" and "closed" worlds of protocols and standards, and the threats to intellectual property rights and to individual privacy.
Beyond the agricultural and industrial revolutions of the past, a globaltechnology revolution is currently changing the world. This book discussesthe broad, multidisciplinary, and synergistic trends in this revolution,including genomics, cloning, biomedical engineering, smart materials, agilemanufacturing, nanofabricated computation devices, and integratedmicrosystems. The revolution's effects on human health may be the most startling as breakthroughs improve both the quality and length of human life.Biotechnology will also enable us to identify, understand, manipulate,improve, and control living organisms (including ourselves). Informationtechnology is already revolutionizing our lives, especially in the developedworld, and is a major enabler of other trends. Materials technology willproduce products, components, and systems that are smaller, smarter,multi-functional, environmentally compatible, more survivable, andcustomizable. In addition, smart materials, agile manufacturing, andnanotechnology will change the way we produce devices and improve theircapabilities. The technology revolution will not be uniform in its effectacross the globe but will play out differently depending on its acceptance,investment, and a variety of issues such as bioethics, privacy, economicdisparity, cultural invasion, and social reactions. There will be no turningback, however, since some societies will avail themselves of the revolution,and globalization will thus change the environment in which each societylives.
The information revolution is bringing about profound changes in many aspects of life. RAND has embarked on a three-year effort, sponsored by the National Intelligence Council, to chart the future course of these changes over the next 10- 20 years, all over the world. As a first step in this effort, RAND convened a conference on political/ governmental, business/ financial, and social/cultural trends driven by the information revolution, as they manifest themselves in various nations and regions. This conference was held in Washington, DC on November 16-18, 1999, with participants from North America, Europe, and the Asian Pacific region, covering a broad cross section of intellectual disciplines.
Introduced in 1998 by the Department of Defense, the concept of information operations (IO) proposed to revolutionize the ways in which warfare, diplomacy, and business were conducted. However, this transformation has not come to fruition. Two large gaps remain: between policy and theory, and between the funding needs of IO initiatives and the actual funds the federal bureaucracy is willing to provide to support these operations. These two discrepancies are central to the overall discussions of Information Operations Matters. Leigh Armistead explains why these gaps exist and suggests ways to close them. Also in discussing best practices in IO, he clarifies how the key agencies of the U.S. government can use the inherent power of information to better conduct future strategic communication campaigns. Information Operations Matters presents a more pragmatic approach to IO, recommending that IO policy be made surrounding usable concepts, definitions, theories, and capabilities that are attainable with the resources available. To meet the threats of the future as well as those facing us today, Armistead argues, it is necessary to use this new area of operations to the greatest extent possible.
This book explores the political process behind the construction of cyber-threats as one of the quintessential security threats of modern times in the US. Myriam Dunn Cavelty posits that cyber-threats are definable by their unsubstantiated nature. Despite this, they have been propelled to the forefront of the political agenda. Using an innovative theoretical approach, this book examines how, under what conditions, by whom, for what reasons, and with what impact cyber-threats have been moved on to the political agenda. In particular, it analyses how governments have used threat frames, specific interpretive schemata about what counts as a threat or risk and how to respond to this threat. By approaching this subject from a security studies angle, this book closes a gap between practical and theoretical academic approaches. It also contributes to the more general debate about changing practices of national security and their implications for the international community.
In recent years, Internet control has become one of the major indicators to assess the balance between freedom and security in democracies. This book explores and compares why, and to what extent, national governments decide to control the Internet and how this impacts on crucial socio-economic activities and fundamental civil rights. The author provides detailed studies on the US, Germany, Italy and further case studies on Brazil, Canada, India, the Netherlands, South Africa and Switzerland, to address topics such national security, freedom of expression and privacy.
The probability of a world-wide cyber conflict is small. Yet the probability of forms of cyber conflict, regional or even global, could be argued as being very high. Small countries are usually signatories to military and economic alliances with major world powers but rely heavily on the technical ability of these powers in protecting their own national interests. They may be considered to be IT ’technology colonies’. Their cyber infrastructure is usually fully imported and their ability to assess it is limited. This book poses the question: to what extent should, or can, a small country prepare itself for handling the broad range of cyber threats? Looking at cyber-warfare, cyber-terrorism, cyber-crime and associated concerns, national experts from New Zealand, Australia, The Netherlands, and Poland present analyses of cyber-defence realities, priorities and options for smaller countries. They show that what is needed is the ability of small nations to be able to define and prepare appropriate responses such as the role of military/law enforcement/business entities, continuity and resilience strategies, incident response and business continuity plans and more for handing nationally-aimed cyber-attacks particularly where these address national critical infrastructures.
