FLAG, Identity Management for ROE

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: Peter Bachman <peterb () cequs com>
Organization: Cequs Inc.
Date: Thu, 27 Mar 2003 11:56:11 -0500
To: dave () farber net
Subject: FLAG, Identity Management for ROE



Hi Dave,

There's been a lot of discussion regarding rules of engagement recently,
and the difficulty
troops have in determining who is a threat, and who is not. This has
been made difficult by the deliberate manipulation of cloth symbols,
such as uniforms, to confuse combatant roles.

This situation can be helped by the use of information technology to
futher develop the use of transponders for civilian identification,
combined with political
"container formation" which will affilate individuals and groups in a
post conflict functioning infrastructure and government.

I put together a simple DARPA type quad project chart last year in an
attempt to judge interest for "FLAG",which is short for "Federated
Logical Affinity Grouping".

It would appear to be a useful concept also for the Iraq conflict. So
I'm trotting it out to see who salutes.

The concept is that civilians in war zones should have an ability to
"de-target" themselves from smart weapons by activating, and thus
showing up on a battlefield map. This takes place at a group level.

Thus pointing the way to relief services, as well as building
infrastructure, as well as registering themselves for those services.
This is derived from known flag behaviors that have guided ROE for many
years, but makes that knowledge available to smart weapons, pilots and
troops.

The technology would involve a GPS device which would "light up" i.e.
transmit it's location, allow for the self registration of a person into
a grouping of people.

This might take the form of a flexible information based
geo-political container, say c=IRAQ,l=BASRA o=Water Management District
cn=Nerigilassar Said. Nerigilassar is the person who has self registered
himself into that container, in the locality of Basra, the organization
of the Water Management District, and the country of Iraq.

The device, (or troops) could then "ident" people, into a mil spec quality
X.500/LDAP political datastore,and provide
instant messaging/mapping for safe passage to an area which could
provide further information/processing leading to an eventual democratic
result, i.e. voter registration, local government and services
formation. The registration would be a keystone towards the respect
of that person's rights within the theater of operations. It's
a self organizing principle, and does not require anything other
than logical grouping.

Air Force surveillance could alter evacuation paths if they were blocked
or targeted.

That information would be shared, confidential, (respecting privacy
guidelines)  available, and jointly managed by DOD and participating
relief agencies using the 1.3.6.1.1.250.1 OID "Non-Combatant" object
which can be entered into a directory structure which is currently
available in commercial and open source versions. This is an ISO derived
numbering scheme suitable for international datastores.

After hostilies had ceased the information could probably be maintained
locally in the form of voter registration.

FLAG participants would be then registered as civilian nationals to
be protected within the defense system. FLAG units could be distributed
at any time and use encrypted communications to selected
receivers.

Obviously there are many practical and perhaps fatal problems which
cannot be
overcome in such a scheme that sanguine readers will point out,
including "false" flags, and privacy issues. But I'm sure other readers
might be able to logically overcome them.

It's difficult to see an actual cloth flag from 3000 ft up, and the
egregious false surrenders and manipulation of identity of
uniforms has made the situation even more relevant, and dangerous to our
troops. This data is best lifted out of the "fog".

If we can "pre declare" segments groupings of the population who wish to
participate, this could be very helpful,
and allow them safe passage, despite attempts at GPS jamming.

Conceptually the device could be built by one of the major electronics
outsourcers just like a game device.

Peter Bachman
Cequs Inc.

peterb () cequs com



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