[Infowarrior] - Pentagon Wants Cyberwar Range

[Richard Forno]

Pentagon Wants Cyberwar Range to 'Replicate Human Behavior and  
Frailties'
By Noah Shachtman EmailMay 05, 2008 | 3:07:00 PMCategories:  
DarpaWatch, Info War

http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/05/the-pentagons-w.html

The Pentagon's way-out researchers don't just want to build an  
Internet simulator, to test out cyberwar tactics.  They want the  
range's operators to "realistically replicate human behavior and  
frailties," too.

Congress has ordered the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or  
Darpa, to put together a National Cyber Range, as part of a massive  
(and massively secret) $30 billion, government-wide effort better prep  
for battle online. The project is now considered a top priority for  
the Agency.  And to make sure the facility is as true-to-life as  
possible, Darpa wants the contractors running the Range to be able to  
"replicate realistic human behavior on nodes," a request for  
proposals, released today, reveals.

Specifically, the Agency wants to have its contractors:

     •    Provide robust technologies to emulate human behavior on all  
nodes of the range for testing all aspects of range behavior.
     •    Replicants will produce realistic chain of events between  
many users without explicit scripting behavior.
     •    Replicants must be capable of implementing multiple user  
roles similar to roles found on operational networks.
     •    Replicant behavior will change as the network environment  
changes, as the replicated “outside environment” (i.e. DoD DefCon,  
InfoCon, execution of war plans, etc) changes, and as network activity  
changes (detected attacks, degradation of services, etc).
     •    Replicants will simulate physical interaction with device  
peripherals, such as keyboard and mice.
     •    Replicants will drive all common applications on a desktop  
environments.
     •    Replicants will interact with authenticate systems,  
including but not limited to DoD authentication systems (common access  
cards – CAC), identity tokens.

These mock people have to be able to "demonstrate human-level behavior  
on 80% of all events," the Agency adds. And mimicking us flesh-and- 
blood types is only one of a wide array of tasks Darpa wants to see  
operators of the National Cyber Range, or NCR, pull off.

The facility should also feature a "realistic, sophisticated, nation- 
state quality offensive and defensive opposition forces" that can  
fight military info-warriors in mock combat. Contractors have to be  
ready to create 10,000-node tests from government-provided "network  
diagrams and configuration files" in less than two hours. And those  
nodes can't just be computers tied into a faux Internet. The NCR's  
operators should be able to "integrate, replicate, or simulate"  
military satellite and digital radio communications, mobile ad-hoc  
networks, physical access control systems, U.S. and foreign "unmanned  
aerial vehicles, weapons, [and] radar systems" -- even "cyber cafes"  
and "personal digital assistances [sic]."

Darpa is moving fast on the project, its first since the dawn of the  
space age that comes from a direct order from Congress.  Although  
there's no money in the Agency's budget for the NCR -- yet -- Darpa  
has already begun reaching out to potential contractors. Proposals for  
the Range are due on June 30th.