The New F-35 Fighter Jet Can Be Taken Down Without A Bullet Ever Being Fired
The F-35, the latest fighter jet being developed for the U.S. Armed Forces, has hit another potential snag.This time, it's not questions of the jet's structural integrity or even questions of relevance in combat.
It's the plane's vulnerability to hackers.
The F-35's helmet displays an augmented reality overview, which is drawn from six cameras across the body of the plane. This enables the pilot to look around the cockpit and, instead of seeing the interior of the plane, see directly through the cameras at the world outside.
This computational capability is all run by a computer system called ALIS.
David Martin, a correspondent for 60 Minutes, reports that ALIS (emphasis ours):
… Looks basically like a laptop computer, and the pilot carries it out to the plane and sticks it in a slot right next to him in the cockpit. That contains all the information about the mission he's gonna fly. The servers which run all of this software take up a room about the size of a shipping container.
This is a juicy, juicy target for a hacker. If your adversary can hack into all that software that's running [the mission], then they've essentially defeated the plane. All without firing a bullet.
So it seems the ALIS has been given too much power over the F-35. For example, ALIS has the ability to ground planes indefinitely if it detects anything wrong with the plane. Human intervention cannot overrule ALIS, either.
Phi Beta Iota: We don't make this stuff up — including the part about computers programmed by morons being able to override highly trained pilots with 360 situational awareness. The Pentagon is not stupid, the Pentagon is corrupt. The DoD Inspector General is a joke (disclosure, Robert Steele has been found eligible and referred to be DoD IG for Intelligence–not likely to happen, the last thing DoD wants in that job is someone with brains, balls, and integrity), there is no Operational Test & Evaluation capability to speak of, and over all the entire Pentagon acquisition process is a melange of complacency, and corruption. The Service leaderships are out of touch with reality, focused on budget share and retirement jobs — they are all lacking in intelligfence with integrity for strategy, policy, acquisition, and operations. Good people trapped in a bad system. Separately Rumsfeld is running his mouth about DoD being “weak” and the US sending the “wrong signals” overseas. DoD is weak by design. DoD is a cesspool intended to fertilize banks, in no way shape or form is DoD actually trained, equipped, and organized to defend the Constitution and the Republic.
See Also:
2013 Robert Steele: Reflections on Reform 2.2 Numbers for 30% DoD Cut over 2-4 Years
2009 Robert Steele: Politics & Intelligence–Partners Only When Integrity is Central to Both
2008 U.S. Naval Power in the 21st Century
2008 Rebalancing the Instruments of National Power
2008 The Substance of Governance ELECTION 2008 Lipstick on the Pig
2008 Paradigms of Failure ELECTION 2008 – Lipstick on the Pig
2001 Threats, Strategy, and Force Structure: An Alternative Paradigm for National Security
1992 AIJ Fall ‘New Paradigm” and Avoiding Future Failures
1990 Intelligence in the 1990′s – Six Challenges
