This is going to get interesting, and the Economist says that this topic will be covered in their upcoming technology quarterly (which is really one of the best things about the Economist). We’ve been following UAVs here since summertime, and I really think it is a) emerging as a technology that has information assurance implications for UK government and b) it’s really cool.

Ranging from powered model airplanes for children to the Predator, UAVs are currently lightly regulated and not at all policed, which should worry law enforcement as well as IA practitioners. With progress in miniaturization in full swing, an unmanned aerial vehicle can carry a camera (the UK is already using them to carry CCTV)… or something quite a bit deadlier. It is clear that legislation and regulation hasn’t caught up to the implications of this.

Meanwhile, at the Popular Mechanics website, there’s a story about the Houston Police Department’s trials of a UAV. The story walks through a lot of the issues revolving around this stuff.

Remember the main IA issue is going to be integrating information flows to, from and about potentially large numbers of these critters into information about more conventional air traffic. As I’ve mentioned before, between UAVs, ultralights and normal increases in air traffic (as point-to-point becomes more popular than hub and spoke and small jets become more ‘affordable’), those charged with keeping air traffic safe are going to have a lot on their hands.

Related stories (copied off the PM site–thanks!)

Civilian UAVs: No Pilot, No Problem

Britain’s Police Drone: Could It Stop Next Terror Plot?

Miami’s New Test Aircraft Gets Look from Army, Navy

Air Scouts: FA-18s Take On UAV Reconnaissance Duties in Iraq

Unmanned NASA Aircraft Enlisted in SoCal Firefight

Sunday Update: “Police and border control authorities are to use an unmanned aircraft to patrol the south coast to catch illegal immigrants trying to enter Britain by boat.” …”It is understood the police have expressed interest in using the £5m drone to monitor crowds during demonstrations and events such as football matches.”

“Andrew Mellors, head of civil autonomous systems at BAE, told the conference: “From 2012 fully autonomous unmanned air systems could be routinely used by border agencies, the police and government bodies.”

Key Section Here: “On-board sensors also give the drone the ability to deal with unexpected incidents, for example by automatically changing course to avoid coming close to other planes in the crowded airspace.

BAE Systems is in talks with the authorities to ensure that the drone does not interfere with civil or military flying. It said that the Herti, in addition to its sensors, had transponders to allow other aircraft and ground controllers to see it on their radar.”

If BAE has the brains God gave a gnat it will put the sensors and transponders in a black box, sell it to everyone who wants to use a UAV, and politely inform government that they have the power to mandate inclusion in all unmanned aircraft….

Here’s the story on the day after…

I have said this before on this blog. There are countries where a national identification card is completely non-controversial. There are possible benefits to society from a well run and properly managed system.

But in my heart of hearts I do not believe that this country’s government (and I do not distinguish between political party here) is capable of building and operating an ID management system at this point in time without disastrous consequences to information assurance.

The Open Rights Group posted today its annual review, including its first full year’s accounts. (Like a number of people who read here, I’m on its Advisory Board.) ORG wants the link blogged as widely as possible…

Some months back a photographer practically made the sign of the cross when I mentioned ORG in an interview. I think one of the challenges ORG has is to make people understand that it’s not against people making a living from IPR - after all, many of its AB members, its patron (Neil Gaiman), and one of its founders (Cory Doctorow) all make their livings by creating and selling intellectual property. What it’s against is the extension of copyright beyond all reason. Since the primary beneficiaries of that are the same publishers who have been grabbing rights from people like photographers, journalists, et al it’s hard for me to understand why the “enemy of my enemy is my friend” principle doesn’t apply…

For Blindside, I suppose the relevance is that if you make a sufficient number of sufficiently anti-public access laws for long enough, eventually you will spark enough opposition to create something like ORG, which really seems to me to have grown on Internet time.

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Via Kable: “Buckinghamshire and Milton Keynes Fire and Rescue Service is planning to use handheld technology for fire risk inspections. It intends to replace its paper based scheme with electronic forms on handheld devices, which make it possible to transmit the reports immediately to headquarters servers.”

Progress marches on. However, “Information captured is stored on the device until completed and automatically updated to a Fire Safety Management application provided by Consilium, which manages Fire Safety Inspections and produces statutory reports.”

A couple of things I hope they’ve thought of: What happens to the data in the device after the Consilium Fire Safety Management application is automatically updated? Does it stay on the device? Is it transmitted securely? And, of course, what happens if a device is left in a pub?

I don’t (at first glance) see that this information needs MI5 level of security, but the providers of this information do have rights under the Data Protection Act, and as property is money these days, I should hope there is some provision regarding this.

The world is changing now.

Ramps may replace stairs in homes and businesses to facilitate access to domestic robots. (Pure speculation on my part, this.)

Domestic robots charged with cleaning and other duties will be equipped with CCTV cameras. (Already exist and offered as a commercial service.)

Some bright lass or lad will equip these domestic robots with prosthetic arms for manipulating objects on command–or autonomously (already exist and working in the lab).

In addition to opening doors and pulling levers, etc., those arms will be able to manipulate tasers or pepper-spray projectors. Domestic robots will then have security responsibilities.

However, to prevent misuse and frivolous use, it is quite possible that the use of robots for security purposes must involve an enabling command from a certified security operator or even a law-enforcement agency, looped in on the feed from the robot’s CCTV camera. It might be a dual decision, with the security operator enabling the owner to actuate the device.

Which of course means the integrity and authenticity of all messaging must be iron-clad–encrypted, authenticated and secure.

So when, 10 years down the line, you are choosing which type of wood to use in the ramp that replaces your stairs, remember the information assurance implications.

And just in case you think this is too futuristic and science-fictiony to worry about, have a look at the first private spaceport–due to be finished in 2010–before Crossrail.

Hat tip to Robert Heinlein’s Door Into Summer, 1957.

This is the first in a series of posts about other UK government groups that are looking at emerging technology and the future.
Yesterday, Chris Smith and I met with Dr. Harry Woodroof and Alun Rhydderch of the Horizon Scanning Centre.

Two programmes listed on the HSC website are immediately applicable to what we at Blindside are trying to do:

“Strategic Horizon Scans: two complementary scans looking ahead up to 50 years. The Sigma Scan covers future issues and trends across the full public policy agenda. The Delta Scan is an overview of future science and technology issues and trends

Wider Implications of Science and Technology (WIST): an expert and stakeholder appraisal combined with a public-facing engagement process, to explore the wider implications of new and emerging areas of science and technology.”

Another HSC feature that interests me, at least, is FAN, the Future Analysts Network, “a forum where those who have an interest in horizon scanning and futures analysis can meet to exchange new ideas, innovative thinking and good practice. Meetings, which are open to all, are held four times a year.”

The Strategic Horizons Scans are available at the websites maintained by the contractors who produced them: The Sigma Scan is available here and the Delta Scan is here.

If I understand correctly, the research output of WIST is fed through to government stakeholders and passed through to a website, Science Horizons.

I’ll have more to say about all of this later, after I’ve had a chance to read some of the material available. I urge you to do the same–many eyes, light work and all that. Comments, as always, most welcome.

This report card in Popular Mechanics rates 5 IPTV services. Some of them look like they will be winners. As someone without cable or satellite TV, I should be grateful. But Blindside has spoiled my innocent enjoyment. What will be the impact on Internet performance? In June of this year, 2.5 billion videos were downloaded from YouTube, according to Reuters.

If, as I think inevitable, the UK government migrates essential citizen services online, can commercial offerings degrade Internet performance to such an extent that it threatens those services? Could telecare, remote surgery and e-999 services be crowded out by new networks hogging the Internet? Well, no–it might even help it. Pure IPTV doesn’t really use the Internet–it’s more like a different cable channel into the home. But it is stimulating development of the technology to get it from the narrowcaster to the PC or TV, and some of that technology and associated infrastructure might actually improve the Internet experience. But in parallel with pure IPTV, video and movies are being delivered over the Internet, and that traffic is growing rapidly. Is it growing quickly enough to justify concern?

In China right now, there are 100 websites trying to do what YouTube does. Telegeography estimates that international Internet traffic grew by 57% last year (down from 74% the year before). However, the firm estimates that capacity grew by 68% last year… so is there a problem? Here the question becomes more business than tech. I suspect there is latent demand for video and movies downloaded over the Internet that will respond very quickly to an increase in supply, especially if supply comes with new technology that improves the experience. The growth in IPTV may provide this indirectly.

As HDTV becomes the norm, each video will be between 4 and 8 times as ‘heavy’ as a normal video today… and although there is unused capacity in the system today, if Internet consumption of rich media explodes (as I think quite likely) that unused capacity will get sucked into service quite quickly.

A company called Black Arrow has estimated that in the US alone, viewers will watch 8 billion hours of online video/TV/movies in 2008 (compared to 376 billion hours of ‘linear’ TV consumption–don’t these people do anything else?). And as you might expect, Cisco is doing its own research, (scroll down halfway) which estimates that total Internet traffic will reach 18 exabytes (quintillion bites) per month, of which 11 of those quintillion will be the transport of commercial video on demand. The article linked to here estimates that necarrier Ethernet equipment spending by providers will double to £7.2 billion annually in the next 3 to 4 years.

I hope it’s enough. Because I didn’t even talk about P2P networks or the growth in traffic associated with mobile use of the Internet, let alone impacts associated with pervasive computing…

One of the issues that emerging technologies will be used to address is the changing demographic profile of the UK. It is simple enough to say that the Boomers are getting old and there are a lot of us. It is also simple to say that thanks in no small part to emerging technologies, we can expect to live a lot longer–and that more of this extra allotment of life will be in good health.

Some of the technologies covered by Blindside that have foreseeable impact on this include nanotechnology and location-based services, and we can expect to see new services, medicines and government policies created to cope with this phenomenon.

But the ageing of the Boomers is happening in conjunction with another societal phenomenon that is just as important. Think of it as convergence of two demographic trends.

The second trend is the atomisation of social structures, in particular the family unit. Family sizes have gotten smaller. The mobility of the workforce has led to families being separated by larger distances. The same trend has led to fewer personal connections that are local and physical. Remote working means that there are people who really don’t have to get out of the house except to buy groceries–and now, even groceries can be ordered online and delivered to your door. And there are growing numbers of people living in splendid isolation. Let’s call them the ‘isos.’ Those who remember Isaac Asimov’s R. Daneel Olivaw novels will understand quickly.

The numbers affected by these trends will be large (although they may not constitute a majority of the population). The services they will ask for will be technological ennablement for the continuation of this lifestyle. But perhaps the services they (we) will need may in fact be more sociological, in the sense that the UK may be better served if society works to draw the ‘isos’ out of their shell and back into the world.

While people will be pressuring (mostly local) governments to provide better and more services electronically, those governments that see farther may push to provide neighbourhood watch schemes, better community centres and opportunities to volunteer.

Interesting times ahead. Aristotle once wrote that man is a social animal. If he were to visit the UK twenty years down the road, I wonder if he’d change his mind? Of course, he also wrote, “Man, when perfected, is the best of animals; but when isolated he is the worst of all”

I’m working on a piece that should run in the Telegraph on September 13 alongside the listing of new BCS Fellows. And the thing everyone wants to talk about (which has become the subject of the piece, and I hope my editor likes it) is the dropping numbers of kids going into IT. Of course, this has been true for women for a decade now - the numbers of women have been increasing in many sciences, but not computer science. But what I’m hearing now is that this is a much wider problem; there’s a variety of reasons and I’ll have numbers in the piece itself, but the short version is that we can look forward to a serious skills shortage in about ten years because the drop-off rate from GCSEs to A-level IT, to computer science in university, to PhDs is considerable at every stage of that progression. Kids are taught in school to be computer literate, but what that means to most teachers is that kids know how to use Word or Excel; not that they know anything about how they actually work inside (the much more fun bit).

Plus, kids get a really negative impression from ”The IT Crowd”.

The implications of this are wider than just “Who will fix the NHS network?” The economy depends on innovation; innovation in all sectors depends on IT; IT innovation depends on education (computer science) instead of training (how to program in Java). But also: who will update the NHS computer system, the banking financial models, the climate change models?

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It intrigues me that despite the massive amounts of recent coverage of climate change and the prospects of running out of energy sources there is so little discussion of this issue wrt technology. Google and Microsoft are having to choose sites for their large data centers based on where they can get close enough to a big enough power supply. Google has in fact called on the PC industry to redesign PCs to consume less energy. And I was particularly taken with Nicholas Carr’s calculation that a Second Life avatar consumes as much energy as an average Brazilian. “They don’t have bodies,” he concludes, “but they do have footprints.”

I spent a month this summer writing about energy issues (as it turns out, not for publication, sadly), and between that and the ongoing media coverage I think about this every time I listen to someone do a presentation on new medical or information technologies: if we no longer have the energy sources to sustain our present way of life what are these technologies going to run on? Is this the biggest information assurance issue of them all?

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