ISSUE 176 : Jul/Aug - 2008 - Australian Defence Force Journal

also been considerable work undertaken to establish either coalition-wide area networks or
guarded links between national networks. While there has been considerable progress we are
still in a halfway house. Any commander can attest to this with the multiple computer desktop
boxes on or under desks. Each represents a stovepiped network. Besides cluttering up HQs,
they impede information sharing, increase operator workload and training and are expensive
to maintain. In short they are the antithesis of NCW. Efforts are underway to streamline
the infrastructure side of interoperability. Ideally coalition members would use their own
national networks and be connected to other national networks by an appropriate security
solution to allow desktop-to-desktop access to information and services such as email, chat
and webpages. That is the goal shared by our allies and coalition partners. No one has the
resources to continue sustaining multip.
Another key enabler of this interoperability goal will be the introduction of the personal key
infrastructure (PKI) token for network users. This card which may double as the Service ID card
will be required to login and personally identify the user on the network. Joint Project 2099
aims to roll out the first phase of this capability around 2010. Importantly the PKI standards
and schedule have been developed at the outset with our allied partners. For the commander
the added security the PKI provides will allow increased trust and hence greater sharing of
information.
Traditionally the ADF has focused on interoperability with the Armed Forces of our coalition
partners. Interoperability for ADF commanders today and in the future is much more complex.
Varying degrees of interoperability are needed with an array of government agencies,
emergency services and non-government agencies, in specific operations that mix can be
enriched by local government and non-government entities. In a welcome initiative, Defence
is exploring opportunities for other government departments to access WGS. This would be
particularly useful in cooperative activities such as border protection.
Applications layer
There is a desire among most organisations, be they commercial or government, to have a
common enterprise services or applications layer across the organisation. For the operator
this translates into a common look and feel and uniform suite of applications across Defence.
In private industry one of the biggest issues in a company merger is how a new acquisition
is going to be integrated into the parent company from an IT perspective. Having all of the
merged company on one network with a common application suite is the ideal. For big mergers
this is easier said than done. Arguably the development of middleware designed to exchange
information between different applications was caused by the need for the enterprise layer of
big merged entities to share information. Defence has benefited from this innovation.
One of the significant advantages the ADF largely enjoys compared with other Defence Forces
is that its two separate restricted and secret networks are essentially coherent. That is to say
a user in most cases can logon anywhere on the network without having to get a new logon
and password. If the move is permanent one can have directories and data reassigned. While
there is still streamlining to do, especially when deployed, this is essentially the case. The
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