Quantum, AI, and Geopolitics (3): Mapping The Race for Quantum Computing

The Race for Quantum Technologies has started.

Among those who are aware of Quantum Information Science (QIS), some call for caution, decrying a potential hype or even denying the possibility to ever see a fully multi-purpose quantum computer – a Universal Quantum Computer.

Related

Artificial Intelligence – Forces, Drivers and Stakes

The Coming Quantum Computing Disruption, Artificial Intelligence and Geopolitics (1)

The Quantum Computing Battlefield and the Future – Quantum, AI and Geopolitics (2)

Yet, as we have shown in the previous article, even though the time when a Universal Quantum Computer will exist may be relatively far away, even though there is indeed no absolute certainty such a computer will ever be created and then industrialised, the very existence of this possibility – even if it is remote – has already changed the world. It has triggered discoveries and evolution in other sub-fields of QIS – namely Quantum sensing and Metrology, Quantum Communication and Quantum simulations – and related usage that can be neither denied nor ignored. We are in the case of a possibly low probability high impact scenario that no one, and especially not security related actors be they public or private, can overlook.

The imagined future quantum-AI world and the related race for quantum both feed into the race itself, giving it its momentum, accelerating and intensifying it, through research and potential and actual usages envisioned.

This is also one of the conclusions reached by the consensual, conservative and very cautious latest report by the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Quantum Computing: Progress and Prospects, published in December 2018. Sponsored by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the report concludes that

“Key Finding 7:…Although the feasibility of a large-scale quantum computer is not yet certain…. Quantum computing research has clear implications for national security. Even if the probability of creating a working quantum computer was low, given the interest and progress in this area, it seems likely this technology will be developed further by some nation-states. Thus, all nations must plan for a future of increased QC capability. The threat to current asymmetric cryptography is obvious and is driving efforts toward transitioning to post-quantum cryptography… But the national security implications transcend these issues. A larger, strategic question is about future economic and technological leadership….” National Academies of Sciences, Quantum Computing: Progress and Prospects – p. 7-20.

As the race for Quantum is fully a component of both the emerging Quantum AI world and the very race itself, we must thus understand its dynamics, its characteristics, as well as its actors.

The purpose of this article is thus to define the framework within which the Race to Quantum can be understood, to present an adequate tool to handle the multiple characteristics of this race, namely dynamic mapping – for mathematicians dynamic graphs –  and to uncover parts of the dynamic map thus achieved as example of what is happening and what can be done to understand.

Read also the follow up articles adding to the mapping:

The UK National Quantum Technologies Programme

★ The Chinese BATX in the Race to Quantum Computing: from Research to Venture Capital through Drugs and Fintech

Mapping the Chinese Private Actors Race to Quantum

Considering the scope of the race, this is work in progress. The research furthermore needs to be permanently updated. It thus necessitates sponsorship for open publication, and/or commission for specific and private use, according to actors’ strategy. Do not hesitate to contact us.

Here, as concrete examples of the dynamic map depicting the race to quantum, we shall present a first series of videos showing how the race unfolds between 1997 and 2028, considering some of the characteristics identified in the first section of this article, as necessary to understand the race to quantum. Each video is accompanied by a classical description of the corresponding part of the race, with the detailed sources used.

  • The first mapping shown as a video (click on the link to access the mapping directly) focuses on the Netherlands, QuTech and QuSoft, to which is added the EU Quantum effort.
  • Then, focusing on state actors, the second mapping will add Germany, the third the U.S. and the fourth China.
  • To exemplify the importance of the private sector in the race to Quantum, the fifth mapping will then add IBM.
  • Finally, the sixth and last mapping will add finance through the Vision Fund, still a potential actor in the race for Quantum Technologies.

Each video notably shows how adding a new actor changes the outlook of the race. Meanwhile, the mapping tool used highlights the importance of using a proper visualisation so that our perceptions of the race reflect as adequately as possible what is happening to take informed decisions.

Subscribe for new articles

Many other actors are part of the race from the UK to Singapore through Australia, Canada, France, Japan or Israel, to say nothing of other private companies from Google to Ali Baba, and will need to be included in the mapping of the race before one can reach a conclusive analysis. Nonetheless, as the reader will discover, crucial elements of understanding are already made available by the six dynamic mappings presented below.

Understanding the Race to Quantum

The first way to look at the Race for Quantum is to try using what we could call a classical framework: identifying public funding. This is the approach that was taken by Freeke Heijman-te Paske, Ministry of Economic Affairs, Netherlands, “Global developments Quantum Technologies“, 8 May 2015 (then presented at the EU Flagship Launch in May 2016), as well as by a 2015 McKinsey document estimating annual spending on nonclassified quantum technology (the two show similar results, and it is impossible to know whom used the research of whom).

Since then, the same figures have been used again and again by many, including by the NAS report quoted above: e.g. U.K. Government Office for Science, “The Quantum Age: Technological Opportunities”, 2016; Patrick Gill, “Here, There and Everywhere“, Technology Quarterly, The Economist, 1 March 2017; Crane et al., Assessment of the Future Economic Impact of Quantum Information Science, IDA, August 2017.

However, the first problem with the Heijman-te Paske/McKinsey figures, is that we are unable to trace sources. Although we shall consider their figures accurate for the year 2015, nonetheless, it becomes impossible to update the estimates, when we are now a couple of years later. It is thus difficult to have a dynamic idea of the evolution of quantum funding when this is a crucial element for a race. 

Second, considering mainly public funding is fraught with difficulties as far as the quantum race is concerned. Indeed, any more in-depth inquiry in the Quantum World shows how much public and private efforts are intertwined. Thus, considering only one or the other effort may, at best, only provide a partial picture. Furthermore, the positive feedbacks between both cannot be depicted and highlighted by lump sums attributed to one country. To illustrate this point, let us take the example of the Netherlands’ Research Centre QuTech.

QuTech  dominates the field of quantum technologies in the Netherlands, and is more particularly focused on Quantum Computing and Quantum Internet. It was founded in 2013 by the Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) and the Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research. In 2015, it received €146 million over 10 years ($168,6 million) from the government through what may be seen as a comprehensive framework for quantum research (Annual Report 2015 p. 7, 35). It was thus designed as a a public-private centre. Its main private and industrial partners are Intel and Microsoft. Intel announced a 10 years collaborative partnership in 2015 with a $50 million funding (Ibid.). Microsoft co-financed QuTech projects regularly (e.g. annual report 2015). In 2018, the American firm established its own quantum research laboratory at TU Delft, Station Q Delft, and Microsoft and TU Delft’s quantum institute, QuTech, will be collaborating intensively on the development of topological qubits (QuTech News, 1 June 2018). 

Thus, should we keep a classical public funding framework, how would we classify QuTech? If we were looking at the Netherlands as a unit of analysis, should we consider only the $168,6 million over ten years, plus “usual” yearly funding in quantum research across the country? But then, how should we regard the private industrial involvement in QuTech, which is not only important in terms of funding, but also access to facilities, cross-fertilization of research and possibly practical output?

Furthermore, other grants, awards and projects also contribute to fund QuTech’s research. For example, in late 2015, QuTech secured a five years funding from the American Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA) “to develop an error-corrected 17-qubit superconducting circuit and the electronics and software to control it”, a project called LogiQ. This new activity, “launched in April 2016, is a partnership of QuTech with Zurich Instruments and ETH Zurich” (annual report 2015).

Are we thus to count this funding as American, or are we to share it between the Netherlands and Switzerland? But if we choose the second option, then are we not losing some information as, at the end of the project, the U.S. also will benefit from the research funded?

Using QuTech case as well as others, on the one hand, building upon the excellent International Conference on Quantum Computing (ICoCQ) held in Paris at the end of November 2018, the papers presented there, as well as discussions with scientists, on the other, we identified crucial characteristics of the Race for Quantum. 

Major features of the Race for Quantum we must consider are as follows:

  1. Existence of a public comprehensive strategic framework (or not) for a given country;
  2. Yearly usual public research funding for a given actor;
  3. Linkages Public-Private, Industry-Research, Finance-Industry-Research (notably though various stages of venture capital);
  4. Linkages across sovereign boundaries (which implies being able to then consider industrial risks, as well as sovereign national security risks);
  5. Onset of efforts (when did it start?), as time and accumulated funding, research, and notoriety matter;
  6. If funding matters, then talents do matter too. Both must be captured;
  7. Considering the shortage of talents, the mapping must allow for capturing as much as possible tomorrow talents;
  8. Communication matters too (capturing imagination – see previous article), we must thus be able to account for this dimension;
  9. Other elements we are currently developing;
  10. All these elements must be seen in a dynamic light for analysis, i.e. data need to be collected over time.

We shall need to integrate as many as possible of these specificities in a state of play to make it meaningful in terms of race. This will then allow us properly monitoring the race. 

It should be highlighted, however, that scientific discovery and engineering creativity is not necessarily a consequence of the amount of funding available or of the number of academic papers published. If the two latter elements are useful measurements of the degree of commitment of actors to QIS, and potentially increase the odds to see the most committed being at the top of the race, there is also no fatality here. Revolutionary way(s) forward in QIS may very well emerge from a small lab and/or from a genius not (yet) integrated within the race or integrated as a small player. 

The Tool: Dynamic Graph Visualisation Software

As we need to consider items as well as linkages among them, then this means we can represent our problem of mapping our actors and their interactions in a graph:

“A network [or graph] is a set of items,… vertices or sometimes nodes, with connections between them, called edges” or ties. (Mark Newman, “The Structure and Function of Complex Networks“, SIAM Review 56, 2003, 167–256, pp.168-169).

As a result, we shall be able to benefit from graph theory – should it be needed – as well as from related tools. 

In our case, we shall use open source and free Gephi, which is a “visualization and exploration software for all kinds of graphs and networks”, as indeed it also allows for dynamic graph analysis, which is necessary for our purpose. This is the same software we use to map issues and for influence analysis for scenarios, as well as to identify indicators for warning.

When mapping the race to quantum, one measure of the importance of the actors will be expressed through the size of the nodes, ranked according to the funding received. In other words, the more funding an actor or a framework receives, the larger the node. All other nodes are resized accordingly. For mathematically savvy readers, this means that the size of the nodes is ranked according to weighted in-degrees.

Similarly, the thickness of the edge (the arrow linking nodes) represents  the yearly amount of funding and varies relatively according to all the yearly amounts of funding of the mapping. 

Mapping the actors of the race for quantum

Considering the scope and breadth of the map, we here focus only on a couple of actors, which also aims at demonstrating the interest of using dynamic graph and integrating the characteristics identified above.

We shall first detail the Netherlands, QuTech and QuSoft map, to which we added the EU funding to be complete.

We shall then add a partial mapping for Germany, focusing exclusively on the latest government’s decision regarding a comprehensive framework, but not fully detailing all German actors. We shall then add similarly the U.S., again focusing on the American Government effort at launching a Quantum Comprehensive Framework, thus including neither unknown military and classified efforts, nor private involvement. Then, again for the sake of comparison, we shall add as exhaustively as possible China, using mainly the excellent report made by Elsa B. Kania and John K. Costello for CNAS. These data should ideally be revised to include a couple of other elements missing, either related to our framework or to evolutions that took place since the CNAS report was published.

Then to give at least one example of the importance of private high tech research we shall include American IBM.

Finally, because we have here a potential disrupter of the race, notably when the competition will be in its later stages, we shall add the Mega High Tech Fund Vision Fund, launched by Japanese Bank Softbank.

Quantum in The Netherlands: QuTech and QuSoft

Our first mapping will focus upon the Netherlands, QuTech, using the data and sources detailed above, as well as later efforts, this time in terms of developing Quantum Software through the dedicated research center QuSoft.

The Netherlands being located in the EU, we also need, to get a proper mapping, data related to EU investment in Quantum, as detailed below.

Become a Member

Edges are weighted according to yearly funding, in million of USD (converted at the time of writing), when data is available. When it is not, then a weight of 1 is attributed to show the existence of a relationship. Only committed funding in programs are taken into account, which explains why some edges disappear over time.

For the period 2010 2028 the Race to Quantum for the Netherlands, QuTech and Qusoft, considering the characteristics listed above 1 to 5, as well as 9 (dynamics) looks like the video below.

The Race to Quantum: The EU and the Netherlands – Video 1

The European Union: The Quantum Flagship

Prior to the launch of a coordinated strategy, according to Freeke Heijman-te Paske (Ibid, slide 8), the EU, through various programs of the European Commission spent on quantum technologies: €17.5 ($19.9) million between 1997 and 2002; €30.5 ($34.7) million between 2002 and 2007; €45.6 ($51.8) million between 2007 and 2014; €31.8 ($36.2) million between 2014 and 2018. 

On 29 October 2018, the EU launched its Quantum Flagship, which is a €1 billion ($1.1476 billion) and 10 years initiative. However, the EU funds only half of the overall amount and the home country of the labs applying for funding will have to finance the other half (Davide Castelvecchi, “Europe shows first cards in €1-billion quantum bet“, Nature, 29 Oct 2018, Official EU page on Quantum Flagship). Thus, the purely EU funding is truly only equal to €500 million over 10 years.

The EU Quantum Flagship is built around five dimensions: “Quantum Communication (QComm), Quantum Computing (QComp), Quantum Simulation (QSim), Quantum Metrology and Sensing (QMS), and finally, Basic Science (BSci)”, which slightly differs from the U.S. approach, but where we, nonetheless, find the same fundamental areas (White House, National Strategic Overview For Quantum Information Science, 2018). For the “ramp-up” phase, which should last three years, i.e. until September 2021, 20 projects were selected with an overall budget of €132 million, across all quantum technologies (press release).

Out of the €100 million, or rather €50 million, per year available over 10 years, the €132 million ($150,4 million) funding for the first 3 years would mean that €168 million (84 for the EU and 84 for the member states) have not been yet invested. One may wonder why there is such a discrepancy, and what is the way forward.

This could potentially start highlighting two related problems that could hit regions, countries and companies unequally: first the relative absence of talents and second the lack of an ecosystem that is thriving enough to be conducive to proper research and innovation in the field, and to applications and usage. In the specific case of EU funding, the notoriously heavy, complicated, costly and peculiar procedures to apply for funding, even more so in the case of the Flagship if it has to be paralleled by a similar process within member states, may also play its part.

As far as talents are concerned, the Quantum Flagship aims at involving “the quantum community at large, with over 5000 European researchers in academia and industry, searching to place Europe at the forefront of Quantum innovation” (press release).  We note here an interesting discrepancy in terms of figures. Indeed, Cade Metz, of the New York Times,  pointed out that “By some accounts, fewer than a thousand people in the world can claim to be doing leading research in the field” (“The Next Tech Talent Shortage: Quantum Computing Researchers“, 21 October 2018).  Meanwhile, Todd Holmdahl, Corporate Vice President, Quantum, Microsoft Corporation estimates in his Written Testimony to the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy & Natural Resources (Hearing to Examine Department of Energy’s Efforts in the Field of Quantum Information
Science, September 25, 2018), that:

“Today, fewer than one in 10,000 scientists, and even fewer engineers, have the education and training necessary to leverage quantum tools”.

Thus, educating scientists, engineers as well as more broadly potential users for quantum technologies is fully a part of the race to quantum and could derail best efforts if not considered.

Germany

In August 2018, Germany announced a €650 million quantum initiative ($ 745,9 million – rate 7 Nov 2018), the framework program “Quantentechnologien – von den Grundlagen zum Markt” (Quantum technologies – from basics to markets – see the official 48 pages pdf), which covers the years 2018-2022, i.e. four years (see also Andreas Thoss, “€650 million for quantum research in Germany“, LaserFocusWorld, 28 September 2018). This program is a combined effort of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research BMBF,  the Ministry of Economics, the Ministry of the Interior, and the Ministry of Defence (Thoss, Ibid.).

Added to €100 million per year ($114,7 million) of governmental research funding for quantum research (ibid.), Germany thus is investing €262,5 million per year ($301,24 million) in QIS.

To this should be added the funding that will be provided by the EU Quantum flagship (see above).

Interestingly, and in line with our point regarding the importance of understanding and imagining a future Quantum world, as well as the necessity to develop a Quantum educated workforce, the German framework includes a dimension related to the explanation of QIS to people (Ibid.).

As a result the race for Quantum now looks as follows:

The Race to Quantum: The EU, the Netherlands and Germany – Video 2

The U.S.

The U.S. has been supporting quantum research over the last 20 years (Interagency Working Group in QIS, “Advancing Quantum Information Science: National Challenges And Opportunities“, 22 July 2016). More recently and progressively, it started building its support into a more concerted effort.

In 2009, the U.S. developed a  “Federal Vision for Quantum Information Science”. Then, a federal inter-agency coordination on quantum research, the Interagency Working Group in QIS,  was chartered in October 2014 (Olivier Ezratty, “Qui gagnera la bataille de l’ordinateur quantique ?“, La Tribune, 25 July 2018). It aimed at developing and coordinating policies, programs, and budgets for QIS research and included “participants from the Departments of Commerce, Defense, and Energy; the Office of the Director of National Intelligence; and the National Science Foundation” (Request for Information on Quantum Information Science and the Needs of U.S. Industry, 2015). As a result of these and other programs, in 2016, “federally-funded basic and applied research in QIS” was “on the order of $200 million a year” (Interagency Working Group in QIS, “Advancing Quantum Information Science:…). Note that Freeke Heijman-te Paske (Ibid.) estimates the American yearly funding in 2015 to €360 million (approx $409 million), which is twice as much as what the American Interagency Working Group estimates.  We shall use the American figure, considering the absence of sources in the Netherlands’ document.

Finally, in the Fall of 2018, the QIS truly started benefiting from a national strategy across not only Federal agencies but also industries, what we call here a comprehensive framework. It is highly likely that the rising tension with China, and Chinese efforts and success in the field and in other emerging crucial high tech areas such as AI played their part in the American concern.

On 24 September 2018, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) conveyed a meeting for “advancing American leadership in quantum information science” (QIS), which gathered “administration officials”, including “officials from the Pentagon, National Security Agency, White House National Security Council, NASA and the federal departments of energy, agriculture, homeland security, state and interior, “academic experts in the field of quantum information science and leading companies including Google and IBM”, as well as “JPMorgan Chase & Co”, “Honeywell International Inc, Lockheed Martin Corp, Goldman Sachs Group Inc, AT&T Inc, Intel Corp, Northop Grumman Corp” (Nick Whigham, “The international race to build a quantum computer heats up with White House summit“, news.com.au, 25 September 2018; David Shepardson, “Key companies to attend White House quantum computing meeting”, Reuters, 24 September 2018).

On that day the White House published the National Strategic Overview For Quantum Information Science, which aims to “maintaining and expanding American leadership in QIS to enable future long-term benefits from, and protection of, the science and technology created through this research…“.

A couple of days before, on 13 September, the House of Representatives approved the “H.R. 6227: National Quantum Initiative Act” to “provide for a coordinated Federal program to accelerate quantum research and development for the economic and national security of the United States”, and “authorize three agencies—the Department of Energy (DOE), the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), and the National Science Foundation (NSF)—to together spend $1.275 billion from 2019 to 2023 on quantum research”, i.e. during the first five years of the 10 years initiative (Gabriel Popkin, “Update: Quantum physics gets attention—and brighter funding prospects—in Congress“, Science, 27 June 2018). Meanwhile, the Department of Defence (DoD) also plays a role in promoting and developing QIS under its own budget (Will Thomas, “Trump Signs National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2019″, American Institute of Physics, 17 August 2018).

Without counting the Pentagon, we thus have a yearly spending of $255 million, i.e. a 27.5% increase compared with the 2016 overall QIS estimated yearly spending. 

Besides or rather with this Federal program, the U.S. is home to a large number of the biggest companies working on QIS – Alphabet (Google), Intel, IBM, Honeywell, Hewlett Packard, Microsoft, AWS (Amazon), as well as successful and promising startups such as Rigetti, and IonQ.

Focusing on the Federal Program – thus keeping in mind that this does not accurately represent the reality of the U.S. effort in the Quantum Race, as the private sector cannot fundamentally be excluded as will show the video 5 below, our mapping now looks as follows (note that in the absence of figure on quantum research post first five years of the comprehensive framework, we did not add any, when funding will likely exist):

The Race to Quantum: The EU, the Netherlands, Germany and the U.S. – Video 3

China

The data for China are taken from the excellent report by Elsa B. Kania and John K. Costello, QUANTUM HEGEMONY? China’s Ambitions and the Challenge to U.S. Innovation Leadership, CNAS, September 2018.

To these, we added the estimate of Freeke Heijman-te Paske for 2015 that we tentatively evaluated to last, besides other newer funding, considering China’s declared intention to become a leader in new technologies, including QIS.

For the most recent funding, we should particularly note that, according to an introduction by Pan Jianwei (the scientist behind the Chinese Quantum effort) at the Hefei Municipal Committee Central Group Theory Study Conference on Quantum Communication (as also quoted by Kania & Costello, fn 83):

“It is planned to invest 100 billion yuan in five years [$14.39 billion over 5 years, i.e. $2.878 billion per year] for the National Laboratory of Quantum Information In Hefei”  Pan Jianwei Introduction. Reporter Zhang Pei, Anhui Business Daily, 24 May 2017.

Besides these state and public fundings, the Chinese High Tech giants are also committing themselves to QIS, notably Ali Baba and Baidu (Kania & Costello, Ibid.) (these are not included in the mapping at this stage).

Meanwhile, efforts to develop applications for QIS are promoted from the provinces’ administrations to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), including through the civil-military fusion’s approach, and through the very large military consortiums (Kania & Costello, Ibid.).

As a result the race for Quantum, focusing on what we know of China’s public funding, now looks as follows:

The Race to Quantum: The EU, the Netherlands, Germany, the U.S. and China – Video 4

As we see with each of the actor we added to our mapping, the outlook of the race changes considerably. What is particularly interesting with the use of a dynamic graph to visually map actors is that what by and large remain very large amounts of money we have  some difficulty to truly comprehend, now become immediately comparable and understandable. Indeed the use of weighted edges and weighted in-degrees for the size of the actors implies that comparisons are automatically embedded in the visual outlook of the map.

Meanwhile, the number of nodes, here mainly research labs and governmental programs, help us better grasping the idea of ecosystems.

Quantum IBM

To give a better idea of the types of competing and collaborating actors and of the stakes involved, despite our still very incomplete map, we shall add one private IT actor.

We chose IBM, notably because it is one very advanced player in terms of QIS. 

IBM, an American company, started researching quantum computing around 1996 (“IBM unlocks quantum computing capabilities, lifts limitations of innovation“, 4 May 2016).

On 4 May 2016, it launched IBM Quantum Experience (News Release). Through this cloud platform, it made available to the public and clients its quantum computers, thus allowing for their use, which is fundamental in the race to quantum as we saw. In 2017, IBM quantum computing research became IBM Q, a new division.  In December 2018, two 5 Qubits and one 14 Qubits computers are available for public usage, and one 20 Qubits computer is reserved for clients, while a 32 Qubits simulator is also online (IBM Q). 

According to IBM annual report (published April 2018),  “more than 75,000 users have run more than 2.5 million quantum experiments. A dozen clients, including partners JPMorgan Chase, Daimler AG, Samsung and JSR, are now exploring practical applications”. In November 2018, according to IBM data, as shown on the screenshot below, 572,945 experiments were run by various users on their machines (IBM Q Experience). 

According to Harriet Green, chairman and CEO of IBM Asia Pacific, “Just in the last five years, IBM has invested over $38 billion in these new capabilities” (Jessa Tan, “IBM sees quantum computing going mainstream within five years“,  CNBC, 30 March 2018).

Now the Race to Quantum looks as displayed in the video below.

The Race to Quantum: The EU, the Netherlands, Germany, the U.S., China and IBM – Video 5

The video shows the current predominance of the U.S., thanks to its giant IT industry. Adding the Chinese no less giant digital companies, considering notably their efforts to also offer quantum computing on cloud platform (e.g. Alibaba-CAS Superconducting Quantum Computer – SQC), thus competing directly against IBM, as well as  accounting for other elements and characteristics of the race, could again change the outlook of the race.

For now, let us turn to another type of actor, finance and more specifically funds.

Vision Fund – Kickstarting Japan, Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E. into quantum technologies

Over 2016 and 2017, the controversial Japanese Softbank created the mega high tech $100 billion “Vision Fund” (Jonathan Guthrie and Sujeet Indap, “Lex in-depth: SoftBank’s credibility problem“, The Financial Times, 17 December 2018). Notably, Softbank is the major shareholder of nothing else than Chinese Ali Baba, and held 29.11% of the giant Chinese company on 2 November 2018 (Kristina Zucchi, “The Top 5 Alibaba Shareholders (BABA)“, Investopedia). 

Announced on 14 October 2016, Vision Fund‘s first major close occurred in May 2017, and its final close in May 2018 (Arash Massoudi, Leo Lewis, and Patrick McGee, “Daimler leads new investors in closing $100bn Vision Fund“, The Financial Times, 10 May 2018).

At the origin of Vision Fund was the meeting of Masayoshi Son, the billionaire Japanese technology investor, founder, Chairman and CEO of Softbank and Saudi Prince Mohammed bin Salman al-Saud, also known as MBS (Arash Massoudi, Kana Inagaki, and Simeon Kerr, “The $100bn marriage: How SoftBank’s Son courted a Saudi prince“, The Financial Times, 19 October 2016). 

As major investors, we thus find not only the Saudi Kingdom but also the U.A.E., two major Gulf countries that must diversify from oil. The fund is “backed by a $45bn commitment from the [Saudi] kingdom’s Public Investment Fund”, which represents 45% of the total ($17 bn in equity and $28 bn in debt), and by a $15 billion commitment from the U.A.E. Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Investment Company, i.e. 15%  of the total ($9.3 bn in debt and $5.7bn in equity) (Andrew Zhan & Adam Augusiak-Boro, “SoftBank: Vision or Delusion”, Equity-Zen, August 2018, using 2017  FT research data). The linkages between Softbank and Saudi Arabia are strong enough to have been reaffirmed on 5 November 2018, despite the Khashoggi affair (Kana Inagaki, Ibid.).

Other investors range from Apple to Daimler through Taiwanese Foxconn (Massoudi et al., “Daimler…”, Ibid.).

Vision Fund is the “world’s largest technology” fund (Kana Inagaki, “SoftBank reaffirms investment ties with Saudi Arabia”, The Financial Times, 5 November 2018). It already holds 25 % of ARM, the UK chip maker, as an in-kind contribution of Softbank. Incidentally, note that ARM is one of the candidates to be chosen by the European Processor Initiative (EPI) in the race to exascale computing (Leslie Versweyveld, “The European Processor Initiative (EPI) to develop the processor that will be at the heart of the European exascale supercomputer effort“, e-IRG, 10 April 2018; Helene Lavoix,  “Winning the Race to Exascale Computing – Artificial Intelligence, Computing Power and Geopolitics (4)“, The Red (Team) Analysis Society, 24 September 2018).

Although Vision Fund is interested in all technologies that could “accelerate the information revolution” and not specifically quantum ones (website), considering its size, and the amount of the minimum investment it makes (Andrew Zhan & Adam Augusiak-Boro, “SoftBank: Vision or Delusion”, Equity-Zen, August 2018), it could nonetheless have a mammoth impact on QIS.

Indeed, if quantum technologies are not mentioned on Vision Fund’s website, specialised media reported in 2017 the Fund’s interest in quantum tech. According to Bloomberg Quint “Shu Nyatta, who helps invest money for the fund, said the group wanted to find and back the company whose quantum computing hardware or software that runs atop it would become the “de facto industry standard” (Jeremy Kahn, “SoftBank’s Vision Fund Eyes Investment in Quantum Computing,” Bloomberg Quint, 26 June 2017):

“We are happy to invest enough to create that standard around which the whole industry can coalesce,” Shu Nyatta, Vision Fund, reported by Bloomberg, Ibid.

The impact could be all the more important that a second fund for another $100 billion seems to be planned, where Saudi Arabia would again equally invest (Riad Hamade, Matthew Martin, and Archana Narayanan, “Saudi Arabia Doubles Down on SoftBank Bet With Extra $45 Billion“, Bloomberg, 5 October 2018). 

As Vision Fund does not seem to have yet invested into QIS, it is included in the mapping only as a “ready to enter the race” actor. It should not be ignored, however, because it is a potentially very disruptive player considering its weight and its investors. Indeed, we may wonder about the potential political, strategic, financial and industrial consequences to see Vision Fund entering massively into the capital of a security sensitive company, or not entering in its capital but favouring a competitor, for example from an adversary country. The potential and changing clout of Saudi Arabia and of the U.A.E. should also be highlighted and deserves a fully detailed strategic analysis (forthcoming).

Here is thus our mapping including the mega Vision Fund. Note that Vision Fund’s edges correspond to capital investments and not yearly investments or fundings as for the rest of the mapping. We nonetheless, for the fund, kept it this way as capital investment also represents continuous influence and future profits.

The Race to Quantum: The EU, the Netherlands, Germany, the U.S., China, IBM  and Vision Fund – Video 6

Throughout these mappings, we have shown the complexity of the race for quantum technologies, highlighting the importance of mapping it with a proper tool. Further analysis and conclusion would demand to complete the mapping, as well as to fully include all the characteristics of the race. Considering the stakes, this is a tool each player should use before to take strategic decisions.

Featured Image: “Majoranas on Honeycomb” by Jill Hemman – ORNL Art of Science images feature visualization effects, neutrons research – 2018 Director’s Choice -This visualization illustrates neutrons (blue line) scattering off a graphene-like honeycomb material, producing an excitation that behaves like a Majorana fermion—a mysterious particle that is also its own antiparticle (green wave). The visualization supports research by Arnab Banerjee, Mark Lumsden, Alan Tennant, Craig Bridges, Jiaqiang Yan, Matthew Stone, Barry Winn, Paula Kelley, Christian Balz, and Stephen Nagler. Public Domain.

Selected bibliography

“CAS Academician is a guest at the Hefei Municipal Committee Central Group Theory Study Conference on Quantum Communication” [中科院院士做客合肥市委中心组理论学习会讲量子通信], Anhui Business Daily, May 24, 2017 .

Crane et al., Assessment of the Future Economic Impact of Quantum Information Science, IDA, August 2017.

Congressional Research Service, Federal Quantum Information Science: An Overview, 2 July 2018.

Kania, Elsa B. & John K. Costello, QUANTUM HEGEMONY? China’s Ambitions and the Challenge to U.S. Innovation Leadership, CNAS, September 2018.

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Quantum Computing: Progress and Prospects. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/25196.

Newman,  Mark, “The Structure and Function of Complex Networks“. SIAM Review 56, 2003,167–256, pp.168-169

U.K. Government Office for Science, “The Quantum Age: Technological Opportunities”, 2016

Understanding (or not) the Nature of Climate Change as a Planetary Threat

On 3 December 2018, i.e. two days before the opening of the 2018 UN Climate Change Conference – its 24th meeting (COP 24), in Katowice, at the very heart of Poland coal country, Jair Bolsonaro, the new president of Brazil, announced that his country would not organize the following round of negotiations, i.e the COP 25, and that he was contemplating Brazil’s withdrawal from the Climate Paris Accord (“Brazil withdraws candidacy to host UN climate change conference 2019”, XinhuaNet, 2018, 11, 29).

A few days before, California firemen had finally succeeded in stopping the two megafires that had been ravaging “the Golden State” during almost a month.

Meanwhile, on 1 December, the leaders attending the G20 meeting in Buenos Aires, Argentina, released a joint statement reaffirming their commitment to fighting climate change by upholding the Paris Accord, even if the U.S. President Donald Trump refused to endorse the statement (Catherine Lucey and Almudena Calatrava, “Trump alone on climate change as G20 find common ground on climate, migration”, Business Insider, 3 December, 2018).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7qFuwLnwF4

Those different political stances are literally drawing the political cartography of the way climate change is becoming a political issue. However, this must be seen in the light, first, of a continued growth of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, which has not been hampered or slowed since 2015 and second, of the international negotiations of the Paris Accord during the COP 21.  Considering thus the context, we may wonder if the different actors really understand the nature of climate change as a profoundly singular threat: climate change is a planetary threat, and thus is “something” that is totally unknown of the collective history; it is not present within the memory of humanity.

Thus, the emergence of a new kind of political frame of mind must also accompany the understanding this new reality.

In this article, we look at the very singularity of climate change and how it imposes a new way of thinking about the relationship between modern societies and a rapidly changing planet. We explain how the new planetary condition is tantamount to a “hyper siege”. Finally, we focus upon the geopolitical consequences of the understanding and misunderstanding of the nature of climate change as a planetary threat on the political frame of mind.

A new planetary condition

Climate change is not a crisis.

“Climate change is not a crisis.

Climate change is a new planetary condition”

A crisis implies the passage from a given situation to another. This is not what is happening in the case of climate change. On the contrary, the very expression “climate change” encapsulates the fact that the planetary climate has left the stability zone known as the Eocene, during which “homo sapiens” developed. Since then, with the industrial revolution and the massive development of the use of carbon fuels, the planetary climate has entered a trajectory of change unknown in its speed and scale in the geophysical history of our planet ( James Hansen, Storms of my Grand children, the truth about the coming climate catastrophe and our last chance to save humanity, 2009).

The relationships between the human species and our planet started being understood as un-secure in 1972, when the Club of Rome, a futurist group composed of bankers, industrials and economists, published its famous report “The Limits to Growth”, which it had commissioned to a team of scientists of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Dennis and Donnella Meadows, Jørgen Randers, William W. Behrens III). The report established that the combined pressures exercised by both the growth of industrial production on the planetary resources and the growth of pollution and environmental degradation would increase the costs of the economic system, while decreasing its efficiency, until growth would no longer be possible. These twin dynamics would go on until the whole system would stop being able to support and sustain itself, once the planetary carrying capacity would be exhausted and the environmental conditions and life conditions fatally degraded. These “limits to growth” were meant to be reached around 2020. This pioneer report opened multiple areas of research, out of which emerged the wider field of research about sustainability and its limits. It was updated in 2004 (Dennis and Donnella Meadow, The Limits to growth – the 30 years update, 2004).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7lmh5XVRW0

In 2005, Jared Diamond, building on transversal studies, and thus following the methods pioneered by the Club of Rome, demonstrated with his monumental “Collapse: How societies choose to fail or survive”, how the choice of certain forms of development could be inadequate, given the carrying capacity of the regional environment and, as a result, lead entire societies to collapse.

This was the “official” start of what we could call the “sustainability versus collapse” studies. In this new field, the report: “Planetary boundaries: Exploring the safe operating space for humanity”, led by Johann Rockstrom, director of the Stockholm Resilience Center (Ecology and Society, 2009) has been a conceptual breakthrough. The research team defined nine “planetary boundaries”, which must not be crossed, because crossing them would fundamentally alter the collective life conditions of humanity. If crossed, these thresholds would be nothing but “tipping points” towards deeply changed life conditions on Earth.

The nine boundaries are: “ climate change; rate of biodiversity loss (terrestrial and marine); interference with the nitrogen and phosphorus cycles; stratospheric ozone depletion; ocean acidification; global freshwater use; change in land use; chemical pollution; and atmospheric aerosol loading” (Ibid.). The report warns that three of these thresholds, i.e. climate change, the biodiversity crisis and the interferences with the nitrogen and phosphorus cycles, are already crossed. Since this research has been published, the world faces the multiplication of extreme environmental events, which are impacting immense regions, such as the Arctic, as well as the economic development of the weakest as well as the strongest economies on Earth, while endangering hundred of millions of people (Harry Pettit, ‘The ocean is suffocating’: Fish-killing dead zone is found growing in the Arabian Sea – and it is already bigger than SCOTLAND”, Mail on Line, 27 April 2017 and Eric Holtaus, “James Hansen Bombshell’s climate warning is now part of the Scientific canon”, Slate.com, March 22, 2016).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HuDd3AakXrw

Welcome to the planetary hyper siege

Beyond the fundamental importance of scientific research, it must be understood that climate change is a planetary threat through the multiplication of impacts felt throughout the world. It means that the alterations of the Earth-system geophysics are turning geophysical conditions against humanity and endangering the very fabric of the conditions necessary for collective life.

This is why climate change, in the words of California governor Jerry Brown, “is not the new normal, but the new abnormal”. He made this declaration while California firemen were waging a desperate fight against the two mega fires ravaging California (“Gov. Jerry Brown says massive fires are “the new abnormal” for California”, The Week, November 11, 2018).

In a previous article, we explained that climate change was tantamount to a “long planetary bombing” (Jean Michel Valantin, “Climate Change: the Long Planetary Bombing“, The Red (Team) Analysis Society, 18 Sept 2017). This qualification is truer than ever, but needs to be reinforced through the idea of “hyper siege”. This means that contemporary societies are being literally “immersed” into the new and adverse geophysical conditions that are besieging them (Jean-Michel Valantin “Hyper Siege: Climate change versus U.S National security”, The Red Team Analysis Society, March 31 2014, and (Clive Hamilton, Defiant Earth, The fate of the Humans in the Anthropocene, 2017).

For example, while the ocean is increasingly rapidly submersing Bangladesh, forcing dozens of millions of people to flee rural lands, the coupling of intense and repeated drought and of the U.S.-China trade war puts the U.S. agriculture under growing pressure (See Jean-Michel Valantin “Climate change, a geostrategic issue? Yes!” and “The US Economy, Between the Climate Hammer and the Trade war Anvil – The US Soybean Crop case”, The Red (Team) Analysis Society, October 8, 2018). In both cases, the vulnerabilities of societies and of their economies are being put under a permanently growing climate pressure that will neither stop nor abate. In other terms, the planetary conditions are becoming a threat for the very conditions upon which modern societies are dependent.

The geopolitical consequences of understanding or misunderstanding the nature of the planetary threat

Understanding the new planetary condition implies a new political frame of mind. This frame of mind must enable to think the evolution of modern societies in relation to the “Defiant Earth” as being in a constant state of both flux and danger. In other words, it means that the political and economic decision-makers and actors have to develop a worldview centred on the idea of change and adaptation, which is not that remote from the way of thinking a strategist would have (Jean-Michel Valantin “Strategic Thinking in the Russian Arctic: Turning Threats into Opportunities (part 1 and 2)”, The Red (Team) Analysis Society, 19 December, 2016).

For example, the rapid warming and geophysical transformation of the Arctic is motivating Russian, Chinese, American and Canadian political, economic and military authorities to develop economic, industrial, energy and military strategies aimed at adapting the different national interests to climate change (Jean-Michel Valantin, “Militarizing the Warming Arctic – The Race to Neo-Mercantilism(s)“, The Red (Team) Analysis Society, November 12, 2018). This adaptation of the policies of the Arctic countries’ authorities to the geophysical change of the Arctic signals the integration of the Earth-system state of rapid change by the worldview of political authorities.

This new political frame of mind is the key to striving and succeeding in finding adaptive and attenuating responses in the face of the planetary threat. Failing to acquire it is not an option.

Featured image: A wildfire approaches Naval Base Ventura County: NAVAL BASE VENTURA COUNTY, Calif. (May 3, 2013) Naval Base Ventura County has evacuated some residents due to smoke concerns as a fast-growing wildfire along the Pacific Coast Highway northwest of Los Angeles has forced residents to leave the area. (U.S. Navy photo/Released) 130503-N-ZZ999-003 – Public Domain.

The Ever Rising U.S.-China Tension – The Red (Team) Analysis Weekly – 22 November 2018

Each week our scan collects weak – and less weak – signals for global changes, national and international security, political and geopolitical risk of interest to private and public actors.

Editorial: Tension appears to rise so high and increasingly so between the U.S. and China (including considering the threat China’s progress in Quantum Information Science creates for American SIGINT – Signal Intelligence – supremacy, among others), that we may start wondering if we should not start seriously envisioning the possibility of war. Continue reading “The Ever Rising U.S.-China Tension – The Red (Team) Analysis Weekly – 22 November 2018”

Quantum, AI, and Geopolitics (2): The Quantum Computing Battlefield and the Future

A race has started for quantum technologies or quantum information science (QIS). Indeed, considering initially and notably the consequences in terms of cryptology – dubbed a “crypto-apocalypse” – no country may allow another state or a foreign company to be the first to develop quantum computing.

However, since the initial worry about cryptology somehow triggered the current quantum revolution, the situation has changed, discoveries have taken place and first proofs of the interest of QIS in general and quantum computing in particular do now exist.

As a result, what could have still been seen as a marginal, potentially far away and maybe still improbable evolution has now changed for something much larger in scope, much closer to the present in terms of timeframe, and also much more possible.

Related

Artificial Intelligence – Forces, Drivers and Stakes

The Coming Quantum Computing Disruption, Artificial Intelligence and Geopolitics (1)

Mapping The Race for Quantum Computing – Quantum, AI and Geopolitics (3) 

The potential advantages – either demonstrated as they already occurred or are taking place, or are still imagined as happening in the future – that could derive from the QIS are so immense that, again, no country nor high-tech company can afford lagging in the quantum race, or even worse, ignoring it.

Indeed, not benefiting from these changes could mean being left aside and seeing the QIS used against oneself. For example, very obviously, no company involved in computers and information technologies, can ignore the race and what the advent of quantum computing could have for its main activity. Many countries, in a world where security matters, are compelled to have what others could develop.

Yet, the very practical advantages one could seek from quantum technologies, or the related threats to security, thus the causes for the race are still relatively inchoate.The quantum revolution, furthermore, takes place in a world where artificial intelligence (AI), at least as deep learning, exists and also develops alongside QIS while both disrupt each other. As a result, foreseeing the future of the quantum technologies applications and their impact is even more challenging.

Nonetheless, being able to imagine and foresee the usage of quantum technologies is also part of the race for quantum. Those who will be at the top of the race are those who will be able to harness first as many usages of quantum technologies as possible, alongside developing quantum sensing, quantum communications, and performing quantum computing and quantum simulations.

In this article, we shall start outlining this first and difficult dimension: how to imagine and foresee the future quantum world. Indeed, it is a fundamental yet underestimated area of QIS. We shall also outline areas that could be deemed as sensitive in terms of security, while pointing out the industrial sectors that will be most impacted.

After having underlined the challenge and specificity of foreseeing a Quantum world and why actually we should merge quantum with AI, thus rather foresee a new Quantum AI world, we shall turn first to quantum communications and the security impact on both states and companies. Second, we shall look at changes resulting from quantum sensing and metrology. Finally, we shall focus upon the way quantum computing and simulations will increasingly impact an larger range of activities, from logistics and optimization to quantum smart ports, with for example, consequences on the Arctic Northern Sea Route, through starting to look for solution to climate change.

Part of this article will be integrated, besides other points, in a forthcoming speech given at the International Conference on Quantum Computing (ICoCQ), which will take place in France at the Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris, 26 to 30 November 2018. The conference will present an up to date perspective on the thriving field of quantum computing. As a result, for now, a large part of this article is offered as an exclusive avant-première to our members.

Towards a Quantum AI world?

The very changes permitted by quantum technologies are still difficult to imagine, notably because the evolutions will result from at least a four steps process.

This is a premium article. To access this article, you must become one of our members. Log in if you are a member. A pdf and e-book versions of the article to download are available for members.

FULL ARTICLE 4657 WORDS – 18 PAGES (PDF)

About the author: Dr Helene Lavoix, PhD Lond (International Relations), is the Director of The Red (Team) Analysis Society. She is specialised in strategic foresight and warning for national and international security issues. Her current focus is on Artificial Intelligence and Security.

Bibliography and Notes

*A Universal Quantum Computer is a computer that may accomplish any type of operation. It is called this way by opposition to quantum computers that would be application specific.

Al-Rodhan, Nayef, “Quantum Computing and the New Space Race“, The National Interest, 20 June 2018.

Biercuk, Michael J., The University of Sydney, “Building the Quantum Future”, Pause Fest, Mar 2, 2017.

“BT ready to ‘lead the world’ in quantum communications“, 18 June 2015.

Davide Castelvecchi, “The quantum internet has arrived (and it hasn’t)“,  Nature, 14 February 2018.

China Spaceflight, “Quantum Science Experimental Satellite (QUESS): September 15, 2017, 395 days in orbit”.

Finch, Sarah, “Quantum, R&D, And Staying True To Your Roots“, Disruption, 9 November 2018.

Gill, Patrick, “Here, There and Everywhere“, Technology Quarterly, The Economist, 2017.

Haydon, Ian, “The Dream Machine for Customizing Biology is Almost Here“, Neo.Life, 26 July 2018.

IPCC, “Summary for Policymakers of IPCC Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C“, 8 October 2018.

Johnson, R. Colin “Is D-Wave a Quantum Computer?“, EETimes, 14 May 2015.

Kania, Elsa B. & John K. Costello, QUANTUM HEGEMONY? China’s Ambitions and the Challenge to U.S. Innovation Leadership, CNAS, September 2018.

Knapp, Alex, “Researchers Successfully Eavesdrop On Quantum Encrypted Communications“, Forbes, 15 June 2011.

Kontzer, Tony “Here, There, Everywhere: Transforming Logistics with Self-Learning AI“, NVIDIA blog, 28 March 2018.

Lanzagorta, Marco; Speaker: Naval Research Laboratory, The future of Quantum sensing and communication; August 31st, 2018.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uqiQ_mP3PM

Las Heras U, Di Candia R, Fedorov KG, Deppe F, Sanz M, Solano E.Las Heras, U et al. “Quantum illumination reveals phase-shift inducing cloaking” Scientific reports vol. 7,1 9333. 24 Aug. 2017, doi:10.1038/s41598-017-08505-w.

Lavoix, Helene, “The Coming Quantum Computing Disruption, Artificial Intelligence and Geopolitics (1)“, The Red (Team) Analysis Society, 15 October 2018.

Metz, Cade “The Next Tech Talent Shortage: Quantum Computing Researchers“, The New York Times, 21 October 2018.

Neukart, Florian Gabriele Compostella, Christian Seidel, David von Dollen, Sheir Yarkoni, Bob Parney, “Traffic flow optimization using a quantum annealer“, 4 Aug 2017 (v1), last revised 9 Aug 2017 (this version, v2) arXiv:1708.01625v2).

Olson, Parmy, “BT Is Harnessing The Power Of Quantum Mechanics To Root Out Fiber-Optic Hacks“, Forbes, 12 November 2018.

Quantum Business”Quantum Computing Could Transform Aviation and Aerospace”, 26 January 2018.

Sablon, Kimberly, Peter J. Reynolds, Fredrik Fatemi and Sara Gamble, “Quantum 101“, Army AL&T, October-December 2018.

Siegel et al. “Computational protein design enables a novel one-carbon assimilation pathway“, PNAS, 24 March 2015.

TechNews, “Volkswagen to improve traffic with quantum computing”, Star Online, 8 November 2018.

U.S. Defense Business Board for the DoD, “Logistics as a Competitive War Fighting Advantage“, March 2017.

Valantin, Jean Michel, “Militarizing the Warming Arctic – The Race to Neo-Mercantilism(s)“, The Red (Team) Analysis Society, 12 November 2018.

Wehner, Stephanie, David Elkouss, Ronald Hanson, “Quantum internet: A vision for the road ahead,” Science, 19 October 2018.

Xing Yi, “China, Italy set quantum technology test“, China Daily, 28 August 2018.

Xinhua, “China to build global quantum communication network in 2030“, 3 November 2014.

Xinhua, “China Focus: China’s space satellites make quantum leap“, 16 August 2016.

Zhang Zhihao, “Beijing-Shanghai quantum link a ‘new era‘”, China Daily, 30 September 2017.

Assessment of Germany 3 billion euros for Artificial Intelligence – Signal

Impact on Issues and Uncertainties

Critical Uncertainty ➚ Possible challenge in the current AI-power race for private and public actors alike – Germany strikes back, but the road ahead is competitive. The possible quantum disruption to AI might be one fruitful strategic choice for Germany, as well as for France and the UK (in a geographical and historical European perspective).

➚➚  Accelerating expansion of AI

➚➚  Accelerating emergence of the AI-world

➚➚ Increased odds to see the quantum technologies impacting AI (and vice versa)
➚➚  Escalating global AI-power race
➚➚  Rising challenge for the rest of the world to catch up

➚ Potential for escalating tension between Europe, the U.S. as well as China

Featured Image: German Flag Pixabay and Mike MacKenzie on Flickr – Image via www.vpnsrus.com – (CC BY 2.0).

Facts and Analysis

Related

Our ongoing series: The Future Artificial Intelligence – Powered World

Artificial Intelligence, Computing Power and Geopolitics (2) – (open access/free)

The Coming Quantum Computing Disruption, Artificial Intelligence and Geopolitics (1) – (open access/free)

Winning the Race to Exascale Computing – Artificial Intelligence, Computing Power and Geopolitics (4) –premium/members-only)

$2 Billion for Next Gen Artificial Intelligence for U.S. Defence – Signal- (open access/free)

Artificial Intelligence – Forces, Drivers and Stakes (premium/members-only)

Militarizing Artificial Intelligence – China part 1 and part 2 (open access/free)

On 14 November 2018, the German Government launched its new Digital Strategy (see below in sources). Within it, we find the Strategie Künstliche Intelligenz, “KI als Markenzeichen für Deutschland” /”KI made in Germany”.

“The Artificial Intelligence (AI) Strategy is to bring research and development, and application of AI in Germany, to a leading level worldwide…”

According to this strategy, 3 billion euros ($3.93 billion)  should be invested by 2025, going especially in research for the Federal funds, while an equivalent amount is expected to be provided by the private sector. If we count that the plan lasts over seven years, this translates into an expected €428 million per year for public funding ($560 million), and as much coming from German companies.

On the bright side, this underlines the creation of a framework considering a public-private research-industry complex for AI, as exists in the U.S. in a way that is quite similar – but broader – to Eisenhower’s military-industrial complex (Military-Industrial Complex Speech, Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1961). Indeed, considering the characteristics of the AI (actually at the moment narrow AI, focusing on deep learning) development at this end of the second decade of the 21st century, it would be meaningless to only look at public funding for AI, without also considering private actors.

Yet, we should remember that just the U.S. Department of Defense’s Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)  invested $2 billion for a program campaign for the next generation AI ($2 Billion for Next Gen Artificial Intelligence for U.S. Defence – Signal). The most recent study by the U.S. Congressional Research Service “Artificial Intelligence and National Security” (26 April 2018) estimated that U.S. technology companies invested approximately $20-$30 billion in 2016, while “DOD’s unclassified investment in AI for FY2016 totaled just over $600 million” (using respectively McKinsey Global Institute, Artificial Intelligence, The Next Digital Frontier?, June 2017, pp. 4-6. and Govini, Department of Defense Artificial Intelligence, Big Data, and Cloud Taxonomy, December 3, 2017).

China, for its part plans to invest $150 billion in government funding for AI by 2030 (CRS, Ibid.). Meanwhile the Chinese BATX among other Chinese companies are making massive investments in AI and are very active indeed.

Hence, the amount planned by Germany remains very small indeed compared with the leaders of the race, China and the U.S. It is nonetheless higher than what is planned by France, i.e. to  invest €1.5 billion over five years (€300 million a year).

Meanwhile, Germany succeeded in taking the eighth place in the supercomputer world Top500 list for November 2018, which is crucial should one wants to be a serious actor on the world stage in AI (see Artificial Intelligence, Computing Power and Geopolitics (2) – free/open access). Germany has 17 High Performance Computing (HPC) systems, and France can use 18 such systems. Furthermore, both, through the EU are well placed in the race to exascale (Winning the Race to Exascale Computing – Artificial Intelligence, Computing Power and Geopolitics (4)).

Finally, if funding and investments are crucial indeed, smartness does not depend upon quantity. Furthermore, the quantum technologies are a very disruptive factor in terms of AI, as we showed previously (Winning the Race to Exascale Computing… and The Coming Quantum Computing Disruption, Artificial Intelligence and Geopolitics (1) – free/open access. And there, Germany is emerging as the top public investor (forthcoming article), with public funding reaching €262,5 million per year ($301,24 million) in Quantum Information Systems (“Quantentechnologien – von den Grundlagen zum Markt“, August 2018). Private investments still remain to be assessed.

As a result, the race for Germany, as well as France if we take a more European outlook – to which we should add the UK despite Brexit, as historical and geographical ties will remain – will most probably be a challenging one, but all is not lost, far from it, considering the highly shifting and fluid environment. Surprises are certainly possible.

Sources and Signals

The Digital Strategy of the German government

The German government intends to shape the digital revolution and prepare the country as well as possible for the future. To this end the government has put together a package of measures which is summed up in an implementation strategy.

KI als Markenzeichen für Deutschland

“KI made in Germany” soll zu einem internationalen Markenzeichen für moderne, sichere und gemeinwohlorientierte KI-Anwendungen auf Basis des europäischen Wertekanons werden. Damit das gelingt, hat das Kabinett die von BMWi–Bundesministerium für Wirtschaft und Energie, BMBF und BMAS gemeinsam vorgelegte Strategie Künstliche Intelligenz beschlossen.

Germany launches digital strategy to become artificial intelligence leader | DW | 15.11.2018

“The internet is new territory,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said back in 2013. It was a comment that prompted ridicule, but at the same time indicated Germany’s lackluster approach to digitalization. Five years on, Germany has finally joined the party.

Militarizing the Warming Arctic – The Race to Neo-Mercantilism(s)

The warming Arctic is the stage of an ongoing maritime, geopolitical and geo-economic revolution.

For example, at the end of August 2018, the Danish Maersk Company, one of the major ship owners in the world and the “world’s largest container shipping company by both fleet size and cargo capacity” (website), sent a first container ship using this route, in order to test its commercial use. The ship went from Vladivostok to Saint Petersburg, through the Bering Strait, following the northern coast of Siberia (Tom Embury-Morris, “Container Ship Crosses Arctic Route for First Time in History Due to Melting Sea Ice”, The Independent, 18 September, 2018).

Since 2013, each year, the number the number of Chinese cargo convoys using the Russian Northern Sea Route, also known as the North East passage, increases thanks to the rapid warming of the region, which transforms it into a navigable space. In the meantime, the Russian political, economic and military authorities have launched a massive program of infrastructure, maritime and defence development of this 4500 km long area, linking the Bering Strait to the Russian-Norway frontier.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owsVkn34a0U

Meanwhile, Russian, Chinese and French energy companies have been developing numerous and massive oil and gas operations in the warming Russian maritime exclusive economic zone (Jean-Michel Valantin, “The Warming Russian Arctic: Where Russian and Asian Strategies Interests Converge?”, The Red (Team) Analysis Society, November 23, 2016). This impressive Russian effort is even more important to understand that Russia is a global energy giant, and works at keeping this status. Currently, Russia possesses vast reserves of oil and gas, with more than 80 billions barrels of proven reserves and 44,6 trillion cubic metres of natural gas reserves, superior to those of Iran (US Energy Information Agency, “Russia”, July 28, 2015).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JiFFDJglSxE

In September 2018, the Russian military organised giant manoeuvres in Siberia and in the Russian Far East. The Chinese military was associated to this “Vostok 18” exercise. Then, from 23 October 2018 to 7 November 2018, NATO organised the “Trident Juncture 2018” manoeuvres in the Arctic region, between Norway and Iceland, thus leading its largest military exercise since the end of the Cold war in 1991 (Christopher Woody, “The US Navy is pushing north, closer to Russia in freezing conditions — and it’s planning on hanging around up there“, Business Insider, 7 November 2018).

In this context, one can see that the Russian, Chinese and NATO military presence and manoeuvres in the Arctic are intimately linked to the geophysical revolution known by the region through its rapid warming due to climate change, because its warming is what makes possible the opening of the Northern Sea Route as well as its energy development. In other words, the militarization of the Arctic is nothing but a complement to the industrial and commercial development by the different stakeholders of this very new geophysical/geo-economic situation. This means that the Russian and Chinese military manoeuvres in the Arctic are part of its economic development: this extension from national economic power to military power corresponds quite precisely to the definition of mercantilism devised during the 17th century, when the European great powers, especially France and Great Britain used military means in order to further their national economic interests (“Mercantilism”, Encyclopedia Britannica). Thus, the militarization of the Arctic by Russia, China and NATO members appears to be a new form of mercantilism in an age of climate change

These occurrences beg the question to know if they are linked by “more” than the opportunities emerging from the warming of the Arctic due to climate change. One wonders if they are not also manifestations of a deep reorganisation of globalization that would be driven by the pressure exerted by new geo-economic national interests, which meet and collide in the warming Arctic.

In order to answer that question, we shall look first at the strategic meaning of the current militarization of certain areas of he Arctic. Then, we shall see how the warming Russian Arctic attracts different Asian national interests and thus becomes a new geo-economic space linking Asia to Russia and the North Atlantic zone. Then, we shall see how the crossover of geo-economic and military national interests might signal the emergence of “neo-mercantilism”.

Armies of the (warming) Arctic

From 25 October to 7 November 2018, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) organised for the first time mammoth manoeuvres in the Arctic region, named Trident Juncture. These manoeuvres mobilised 50.000 soldiers, 150 planes, 10.000 land vehicles and 60 warships. They were centred on Norway and Iceland, where landing, deployment and combat exercises took place. They were led to demonstrate the reaction capability against a hypothetical and unnamed adversary that would endanger a fellow NATO member in the Arctic region. This official “anonymousness” did not stop Russia to protest officially against this military exercise taking place very close to its land and maritime frontiers (Christopher Woody, “Russia aims its missile drills shoulder-to-shoulder with NATO’s biggest war games in years”, Business Insider, 31 October, 2018).

However, it must be noted that, from 11 to 17 September 2018, the Russian military organised massive military manoeuvres of its own named Vostock 18, mobilising 300.000 soldiers, more than 36.000 land vehicles, 80 warships and 1000 planes. For the first time, the Russian political and military authorities had invited the Chinese People’s Liberation Army to participate to this exercise, thus giving a supplementary geopolitical significance to this event by demonstrating the political and military closeness of Russia and China in the face of possible strategic threats (Lyle J. Goodstein, “What Russia’s Vostok-18 Exercise with China Means“, The National Interest, September 5, 2018).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_3hYkXPx5Aw

Access for non-members or for your package is limited.
To continue reading, become a member of The Red (Team) Analysis Society.
If you are already a member, please login (don’t forget to refresh the page).

Full article 2455 words – 9 PAGES (pdf)

 

Jean-Michel Valantin (PhD Paris) leads the Environment and Geopolitics Department of The Red (Team) Analysis Society. He is specialised in strategic studies and defence sociology with a focus on environmental and artificial intelligence geostrategy.

Featured image: U.S. Marines with 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit participating in Exercise Trident Juncture 18 offload an Assault Amphibious Vehicle, carried on a Landing Craft Air Cushion, in Ålvund, Norway, Oct. 30, 2018. Trident Juncture 18 enhances the U.S. and NATO Allies’ and partners’ abilities to work together collectively to conduct military operations under challenging conditions, 30 October 2018, by U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. Menelik Collins, Public Domain.

Modeling for Dynamic Risks and Uncertainties (1) : Mapping Risk and Uncertainty

(This article is a fully updated version of the original article published in November 2011 under the title “Creating a Foresight and Warning Model: Mapping a Dynamic Network (I)”).Mapping risk and uncertainty is the second step of a proper process to correctly anticipate and manage risks and uncertainties.  This stage starts with building a model, which, once completed, will describe and explain the issue or question at hand, while allowing for anticipation or foresight. In other words, with the end of the first step, you have selected a risk, an uncertainty, or a series of risks and uncertainties, or an issue of concern, with its proper time frame and scope, for example, what are the risks and uncertainties to my …

Continue reading “Modeling for Dynamic Risks and Uncertainties (1) : Mapping Risk and Uncertainty”

The remaining part of this article is for our members and those who purchased special access plans. Make sure you get real analysis and not opinion, or, worse, fake news. Log in and access this article.

The Khashoggi’s Mystery and the Need for a Wake Up Call – The Red (Team) Analysis Weekly – 25 October 2018

Each week our scan collects weak – and less weak – signals for global changes, national and international security, political and geopolitical risk of interest to private and public actors.

Editorial:  The New York Times’ article “Why Jamal Khashoggi’s Killing Has Resonated” by Megan Specia ponders what many have been wondering lately. Why on earth would the murder of Mr Khashoggi, definitely an atrocious crime, definitely terrible for his family and definitely wrong, yet an event that hardly obviously belongs to international relations and even less to major historical events, take center stage not only in the media but also for international actors be they public or private?

A potential attack on press freedom or denunciation of Saudi Arabia’s human rights’ breaches cannot be a sufficient answer, considering the number of journalist murders or jailed on the one hand, so many countries’ breaches of human rights on the other. Actually, most of the time, these events do not stir anything.

Megan Specia (Ibid.) gives an answer in four main points: “Mr. Khashoggi was a prominent writer with powerful friends”; “A killing inside a consulate, often a place of refuge, is shocking”; “Leaks to Turkish media kept the story in the headlines”; “The Saudi crown prince had already set the stage for tense geopolitics”.

Her first and last points are certainly the most interesting, especially read together, as they point towards factions war within Saudi Arabia, with ramifications outside the country and manipulations of the media and public opinion. Worryingly, the propaganda operation – assuming there was one – worked extremely well, with foreign heads of states, diplomats and CEOs falling into the trap and becoming pawns in a game they do not master.

There is, however, also another point that must be made, or to the least pondered, about the Khashoggi affair and its resonance, a point related to international public opinion: increasingly, important even crucial events and dynamics are completely downplayed or stir absolutely no interest when, on the contrary, irrelevant matters do.

To take a very easy example, extreme weather events pile worldwide, while the IPCC panel issued its sternest and most urgent warning ever, yet it feels as if nobody was really concerned. The amazing hailstorm on Rome, on 21 October, was not even crowdsourced by the Weekly algorithm, and did not make international news, at least not anywhere on a par with Mr Khashoggi’s murder. Yet, climate change impacts are incredibly more important, for the whole world and for each and every human being, than what happened in the Saudi Arabia’s consulate.

Meanwhile, the Cold War is finally coming to an end in East Asia, artificial intelligence and quantum computing seem to point towards the birth of a completely new paradigm, tensions between the U.S. and China are high indeed… etc.

Yet, people prefer being fascinated with a murder.

The why this is happening deserves being pondered because, considering the stakes, our very survival could depend on it.

However unpalatable, we may wonder if the information overload created by the world-wide-web, and the way major high-tech actors’ interest end up favouring very low quality content, where analysis is disappearing for opinion, has not a large part of responsibility in what is happening.

We may also wonder if the very real and serious and threatening stakes at hand are not so frightening that people just prefer to ignore them in a mad rush forward, seizing any piece of information that could assuage their rising anxiety. In that case, the fascination with Mr Khashoggi’s murder would be a symptom of denial and escapism.

In both cases, after proper and detailed analysis, responses must be designed, given and truly implemented.

Should such new dynamics take place, then, the sad murder of a journalist would have served as a wake up call, and, after all, become truly a historical event.

Find out more on horizon scanning, signals, what they are and how to use them:

“Horizon Scanning and Monitoring for Anticipation: Definition and Practice“.

Read below our latest complimentary Weekly horizon scanning. 

Each section of the scan focuses on signals related to a specific theme: world (international politics and geopolitics); economy; science; analysis, strategy and futures; AI, technology and weapons; energy and environment. However, in a complex world, categories are merely a convenient way to present information, when facts and events interact across boundaries.

Read the 25 October 2018 scan→

The Weekly is the complimentary scan of The Red (Team) Analysis Society. It focuses on political and geopolitical uncertainty, on national and international security issues.

The information collected (crowdsourced) does not mean endorsement but points to new, emerging, escalating or stabilising problems and issues.

Featured image: Antennas of the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), on the Chajnantor Plateau in the Chilean Andes. The Large and Small Magellanic Clouds, two companion galaxies to our own Milky Way galaxy, can be seen as bright smudges in the night sky, in the centre of the photograph. This photograph was produced by European Southern Observatory (ESO), ESO/C. Malin [CC BY 4.0], via Wikimedia Commons.

Modeler la Sécurité du Cyber Future – Agora 41, Assemblée Stratégique pour l’ANSSI

Alors que nous entrons dans la «quatrième révolution industrielle», dans l’ère de la transformation numérique, dans un nouvel «IA-monde» et dans la «seconde révolution quantique», la sécurité nationale et internationale doit s’adapter. Elle doit le faire en anticipant ce monde futur, en évitant les surprises et les menaces tant nouvelles qu’anciennes, tout en saisissant les immenses possibilités offertes par ce qui n’est rien moins qu’un changement de paradigme (Pour les labels, respectivement, Klaus Schwab, World Economic Forum, Helene Lavoix, The Future Artificial Intelligence – Powered World series, The Red (Team) Analysis Society, Jonathan P. Dowling, Gerard J. Milburn, “Quantum Technology: The Second Quantum Revolution”, 13 Jun 2002, arXiv:quant-ph/0206091v1).

Access English version

La stratégie relative au cyber-espace et à la cyber-sécurité varie selon les pays – et les acteurs. Elle est gérée de différentes manières par différents types d’agences. Après avoir présenté brièvement les principaux acteurs étatiques français, britanniques et américains de la cyber-sécurité, nous nous concentrerons sur la perspective française et l’ANSSI, ses objectifs et sa récente initiative de réflexion, Agora 41.

La France, le Royaume-Uni et les États-Unis – bref aperçu

En France, l’Agence Nationale de la Sécurité des Systèmes d’Information (ANSSI), créée le 7 juillet 2009, s’occupe de la sécurité du monde digital. Elle est l’autorité nationale pour toutes les questions liées à la défense et à la sécurité des systèmes d’information et, de ce fait, conduit la Stratégie nationale de sécurité numérique française (2015). Néanmoins, d’autres dimensions du cyber-espace restent sous l’autorité d’autres parties de l’État, notamment le ministère de l’Intérieur et le ministère de la Défense, qui prévoit un budget de 1,6 milliard d’euros pour 2019-2025 pour la cyber-sécurité, tandis que son commandement en matière de cyber-défense, créé en 2016, verra une augmentation de ses dépenses de personnel (Benjamin Hue, “La France va renforcer son arsenal contre la cybercriminalité“, RTL, 24 janvier 2018). Une nouvelle stratégie nationale en matière de cyber-sécurité sur cinq ans, avec un budget global clair, est nécessaire, et pourrait être en préparation (Ibid.).*

L’ANSSI correspond plus ou moins au Centre National Britannique de Cybersécurité (National Cyber Security Center – NCSC), appartenant au GCHQ, ouvert en octobre 2016 et officiellement lancé le 14 février 2017, et participant pleinement à la CyberUK strategy de 2017 (lancement du NCSC, video et documents; Reuters, “Britain to spend 1.9 billion pounds on boosting cyber defenses“). Le budget global du Royaume-Uni pour la cybersécurité pour tous les ministères (sans compter le budget potentiel pour les cyber-représailles et les attaques) s’élève à £1,9 milliard pour 2017-2022 (“Chancellor’s speech at the National Cyber Security Centre opening“, 14 février 2017; Reuters, Ibid. .)

L’ANSSI et le NCSC sont les héritiers de la mission cryptographique passée des institutions étatiques. L’ANSSI est le dernier né de la Direction Technique des Chiffres (DTC) créée en 1943 à Alger (Histoire de l’ANSSI). De son côté, le NCSC, à travers le GCHQ, est ancré dans le célèbre Bletchley Park qui, grâce notamment à Turing, à l’équipe de codebreakers et aux Bombes machine, a vaincu Enigma et ainsi contribué à la victoire des Alliés pendant la Seconde Guerre Mondiale. Auparavant, ses origines remontent aux efforts de décryptage  déployés par l’Amirauté et le War Office pendant la Première Guerre Mondiale (par exemple, GCHQ, «The story of Signals Intelligence 1914-2014»).

En ce qui concerne les États-Unis, leur budget fédéral cybersécurité est de 15 milliards de dollars pour 2019, et  éclipse les efforts européens, mais doit être partagé entre toutes les agences dotées de cyber-éléments, du Pentagone à la NASA en passant par la Small Business Administration (John Slye, “The Fy 2019 Budget Increases Cybersecurity Funding By Nearly $600 Million“, Deltek, 28 Février 2018).

cybersecurity, U.S., ANSSI, Agora 41
U.S. Federal Cybersecurity Funding FY 2017-2019 by John Slye, “The Fy 2019 Budget Increases Cybersecurity Funding By Nearly $600 Million“, Deltek, 28 Février 2018

Cependant, et malgré la fameuse National Security Agency/Central Security Service (NSA/CSS), aucune nouvelle agence ni centre unifié n’est dédié au nouveau monde cyber et à sa sécurité, comme cela est fait en France et au Royaume-Uni (David H. Petraeus, “The Case for a National Cybersecurity Agency“, Belfer Center, 5 septembre 2018). L’ Office of Cybersecurity and Communications de la National Protection and Program Directorate (NPPD) au sein du Département de la sécurité intérieure (DHS) pourrait être vu comme approchant le système britannique ou français. Cependant, en tant qu'”Office”, il ne dispose pas de l’autonomie, du poids et du leadership que l’on peut trouver en Europe. En outre, vu son emplacement et le nombre d’autres agences impliquées dans la cyber-sécurité, il est très probable que l’OCC / NPPD consacre du temps, des ressources et de l’énergie à des escarmouches et querelles administratives.

Cela dit, le budget américain consacré à la cybersécurité reste pour le moins très important. Qui plus est, les États-Unis bénéficient d’un “cyber-écosystème” qui est un atout formidable. Cet écosystème est créé par le cyber-budget fédéral et les agences et bureaux en bénéficiant, les GAFA et autres sociétés telles que Intel, NVIDIA et IBM, pour en nommer seulement quelques-unes, la Silicon Valley, des milliardaires patriotes et concernés et des universités de classe mondiale, comme le montre l’initiative de 1 milliard de dollars du MIT “pour faire face aux opportunités et aux défis mondiaux présentés par la prédominance de l’informatique et la montée de l’intelligence artificielle (IA)” qui inclus un don de 350 millions de dollars de Stephen A. Schwarzman, PDG de Blackstone (MIT Review, “MIT reshapes itself to shape the future“).

Si Eisenhower soulignait l’importance du complexe militaro-industriel pour comprendre la sécurité nationale des États-Unis (Military-Industrial Complex Speech, Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1961), nous pourrions désormais devoir aussi compter avec un complexe gouvernementalo-High-Tech. Le future programme “JEDI” pour le Département de la Défense ne peut que renforcer cette tendance (Helene Lavoix, “Artificial Intelligence, Computing Power and Geopolitics (2)“, The Red (Team) Analysis Society, 25 June 2018; Shaun Nichols, “US JEDI military cloud network is so high-tech, bidders will have to submit their proposals by hand, on DVD“, The Register, 27 Sep 2018).

De son côté, l’OTAN travaille à la mise en place d’un nouveau centre de commandement cyber-militaire, qui devrait être prêt pour 2023 (Robin Emmott, “”NATO cyber command to be fully operational in 2023“, Reuters, 16 octobre 2018).

Une perspective complète et plus détaillée devrait notamment inclure la Chine.

L’ANSSI, de la stratégie à l’anticipation et au groupe de réflexion

En tant que leader de la stratégie française de cybersécurité, l’ANSSI vise à atteindre cinq objectifs principaux (site web):

  1. “Garantir la souveraineté nationale”: notamment défense de l’intérêt national fondamental dans le cyber-espace.
  2. “Apporter une réponse forte contre les actes de cybermalveillance”: Promouvoir l’utilisation de l’espace cybernétique et protéger les citoyens, en réagissant fermement contre tout type de cybercriminalité.
  3. “Informer le grand public”, c’est à dire sensibilisation à la sécurité numérique.
  4. “Faire de la sécurité numérique un avantage concurrentiel pour les entreprises françaises”.
  5. “Renforcer la voix de la France à l’international”,  soit l’influence française internationale, à travers la définition des normes, la promotion de la stabilité cybernétique mondiale, et la promotion de l’autonomie européenne.

Qui plus est, l’ANSSI doit avoir une forte activité de prospective stratégique et d’anticipation sur tous les horizons temporels pour pouvoir assurer la sécurité du nouveau monde émergent, tout en faisant face aux menaces et aux risques très concrets du présent.

En effet, par exemple, parmi de nombreux impacts, l’informatique quantique perturbera complètement la transmission sécurisée des données, tandis que les villes et les entreprises qui utilisent abondamment l’intelligence artificielle (par apprentissage en profondeur/Deep Learning) devront être sécurisées. La communication quantique, quant à elle, tente par exemple de développer de nouveaux réseaux quantiques sur lesquels pourrait être construit dans le futur un internet quantique (Edd Gent, “From Quantum Computing to a Quantum Internet—A Roadmap“, SingularityHub, 22 October 2018). L’informatique quantique, ou plus largement les technologies quantiques, et l’intelligence artificielle, s’accélérant et se perturbant mutuellement, comme nous l’avons vu (The Coming Quantum Computing Disruption, Artificial Intelligence and Geopolitics (1)”, 15 octobre 2018) créeront de nouveaux cyber-défis auxquels les agences, les entreprises et les citoyens doivent être préparés.

Les vidéos ci-dessous illustrent un possible avenir et ses enjeux de sécurité (bande annonce française de la série TV Person of Interest saison 4 de J.J. Abrahams et trailer officiel en anglais; NVIDIA GTC China 2017 Keynote Recap, notamment la partie sur les villes intelligentes).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LCOHx9YIdiE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2a55OLQOqF0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKL4wDTmtc0

 

Dans le même temps, alors que les impacts multidimensionnels néfastes du changement climatique se propagent et s’intensifient, les conséquences sur la cybersécurité  doivent également être pris en compte.

Comme le souligne le Sénat,

“L’un des axes retenus dans la stratégie de l’ANSSI pour la période 2016-2020, intitulé « connaissance et anticipation » a pour objectif de renforcer sa capacité à mener des travaux de prospective, à anticiper les nouvelles menaces et à favoriser l’émergence de nouvelles technologies ou de nouveaux usages susceptibles d’avoir un impact en matière de sécurité informatique.”(Projet de loi de finances pour 2018 : Direction de l’action du Gouvernement : Coordination du travail gouvernemental” 23 novembre 2017)

Dans ce cadre, l’ANSSI a lancé un programme de réflexion original, Agora 41, au sein duquel 41 experts ont été sélectionnés et invités à participer à une nouvelle expérience visant à développer des solutions innovantes pour soutenir l’agence dans sa mission.

Cinq thèmes ont été sélectionnés pour servir la réalisation de la stratégie de cybersécurité et de ses objectifs, tout en respectant les impératifs de prospective stratégique.

  • Imaginaire, Cyber-monde et Sécurité
  • Entrent les GAFA et BATX: De nouvelles règles pour un nouveau jeu sur un nouvel échiquier?
  • Gagner la Guerre des Talents
  • Cyber-cohabitation
  • Mettre en place un cyber-écosystème victorieux pour la sécurité

Chaque membre d’Agora 41 a choisi un thème principal, tout en ayant la possibilité d’interagir sur les autres questions. Ce système  cherche à permettre des discussions fructueuses avec échanges horizontaux entre questions.

Ensemble, ces efforts pourraient contribuer à façonner non seulement la future cybersécurité, mais également notre cyber-futur.

————

* Il est presque impossible, de l’extérieur, d’évaluer avec précision le budget de l’ANSSI compte tenu de son “autonomie budgétaire limitée” au sein du SGDSN (“Projet de loi de finances pour 2018 : Direction de l’action du Gouvernement : Coordination du travail gouvernemental“, 23 novembre 2017. Comme l’a souligné le Sénat (Solutions numériques, “ANSSI : un rapport sénatorial préconise d’élargir son autonomie de gestion budgétaire“, 19 avril 2018), cette autonomie partielle contribue à occulter les besoins vitaux et à nuire à l’efficacité de l’ANSSI en la privant de ressources vitales, et ce d’autant plus que ses missions sont élargies et le seront plus encore dans un avenir prévisible. Qui plus est, le risque de querelles et de tracasseries administratives est accru.

Disclaimer: L’auteur participe à l’effort Agora 41 mais reste indépendante dans ses réflexions, condition sine qua non du succès de l’initiative de sensibilisation de l’ANSSI. Les opinions exprimées dans ce rapport représentent les vues et interprétations de l’auteur, sauf indication contraire. Cet article n’implique pas l’approbation de la politique, des programmes ou des réglementations par l’ANSSI.

À propos de l’auteur: Dr Helene Lavoix,, PhD Lond (Relations internationales), est la directrice de The Red (Team) Analysis Society. Elle est spécialisée dans la prospective stratégique et l’alerte en matière de sécurité nationale et internationale. Elle se concentre actuellement sur l’intelligence artificielle, l’informatique quantique et la sécurité.

Featured Image: The Argonne-led “Multiscale Coupled Urban Systems” project aims to help city planners better examine complex systems, understand the relationships between them and predict how changes will affect them. The ultimate goal is to help officials identify the best solutions to benefit urban communities. (Image by Argonne National Laboratory.)

Shaping the Security of the Cyber Future – Agora 41, Strategic Outreach for the French National Cybersecurity Agency

Accès à la version française

As we enter the “fourth industrial revolution”, the age of the digital transformation, a new emerging “AI-world”, and the “second quantum revolution”, national and international security must adapt. It must do so by anticipating this future world, avoiding surprises related to new – but also old – threats and dangers, while seizing the immense opportunities offered by what is no less than a change of paradigm (For the labels, respectively, Klaus Schwab, World Economic Forum, Helene Lavoix, The Future Artificial Intelligence – Powered World series, The Red (Team) Analysis Society, Jonathan P. Dowling, Gerard J. Milburn, “Quantum Technology: The Second Quantum Revolution”, 13 Jun 2002, arXiv:quant-ph/0206091v1).

The strategy related to cyber space and cyber security varies according to countries – and actors. It is handled in various ways by different types of agencies. After having briefly presented the main French, British and American state actors for cyber security, we shall focus on the French outlook and present the ANSSI, its goals and finally new outreach initiative, Agora 41.

France, the UK and the U.S. – a brief overview

In France, the Agence Nationale de la Sécurité des Systèmes d’Information (ANSSI) – National Agency for Cyber Security, created on 7 July 2009,  deals with the security of the cyber world. It is the national authority for all matters related to the defence and security of information systems and, as a result, leads the French National Strategy for Digital Security (2015). Nonetheless, other cyber dimensions remain under other types of state authorities, notably the ministry of Interior and the ministry of Defence, which plans a €1.6 billion budget for 2019-2025 for cyber security, while its cyber defence command, created in 2016, will see an increase in personal (Benjamin Hue, “La France va renforcer son arsenal contre la cybercriminalité“, RTL, 24 January 2018). A new national cyber strategy over five years with a clear overall budget is necessary and could be forthcoming (Ibid.).*

The ANSSI more or less corresponds to the more recent British National Cyber Security Center (NCSC), a part of the GCHQ, opened in October 2016 and officially launched on 14 February 2017, fully participating to the 2017 CyberUK strategy (launch of the NCSC, video and documents; Reuters, “Britain to spend 1.9 billion pounds on boosting cyber defenses“). The overall UK budget for cybersecurity across all ministries (but not including potential budget for cyber-retaliations and attacks) reaches £1.9 billion for 2017-2022 (“Chancellor’s speech at the National Cyber Security Centre opening“, 14 February 2017; Reuters, Ibid.).

Both the ANSSI and the NCSC are heir to the past cryptographic mission of states’ institutions. The ANSSI is the latest child of the Direction Technique des Chiffres (DTC) created in 1943 in Alger (ANSSI History). For its part, the NCSC, through the GCHQ, is indeed grounded  in the most famous Bletchley Park, which, notably thanks to Turing, the team of codebreakers and the Bombes machine they created, defeated the German Enigma Machine and thus contributed to the Allies victory during World War 2 . Before that, its ancestry can be traced to the codebreaking efforts at the Admiralty and War Office during World War 1 (e.g. GCHQ, “The story of Signals Intelligence 1914-2014″).

Cybersecurity in the U.S. benefits from a $15 billion federal budget for FY 2019 dwarfing European efforts, but to share among all agencies with a cyber element, from the NASA to the Small Business Administration (John Slye, “The Fy 2019 Budget Increases Cybersecurity Funding By Nearly $600 Million“, Deltek, 28 February 2018).

U.S. Federal Cybersecurity Funding FY 2017-2019 by John Slye, “The Fy 2019 Budget Increases Cybersecurity Funding By Nearly $600 Million“, Deltek, 28 February 2018

Nonetheless, and despite the famous National Security Agency/Central Security Service (NSA/CSS), no new agency nor overarching centre handles the new cyber world and its security in the leading way developed in both France and the UK (David H. Petraeus, “The Case for a National Cybersecurity Agency“, Belfer Center, 5 September 2018).  The Office of Cybersecurity and Communications of the National Protection and Program Directorate (NPPD)  within the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) could be seen as an effort approaching the British and French approach. However, being an Office, it does not have the autonomy, weight and leadership that may be found in Europe. Furthermore, by its very location and by the number of other agencies involved, the OCC/NPPD is very likely to have to devote time, resources and energy to administrative skirmishes and quarrels.

That said, the American cybersecurity budget remains very large indeed. Meanwhile, the U.S. benefits of a “cyber ecosystem”, which is a formidable assets. This ecosystem is created by the Federal cyber budget and the benefiting agencies and offices, the GAFA – and other companies such as Intel, NVIDIA and IBM to quote only a few – the Silicon Valley, patriot and concerned billionaires and world-class universities, as shown by the $ 1 billion MIT initiative “to address the global opportunities and challenges presented by the prevalence of computing and the rise of artificial intelligence (AI),” including a $350 million gift by Stephen A. Schwarzman, CEO of Blackstone (MIT Review, “MIT reshapes itself to shape the future“).

If Eisenhower pointed out the importance of the military–industrial complex to understand American national security (Military-Industrial Complex Speech, Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1961), it could well be that we now must also count with a similar but larger and deeper cyber-IT-whole of government complex.  The about to be born “Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) program for the Department of Defense could only reinforce this trend (Helene Lavoix, “Artificial Intelligence, Computing Power and Geopolitics (2)“, The Red (Team) Analysis Society, 25 June 2018; Shaun Nichols, “US JEDI military cloud network is so high-tech, bidders will have to submit their proposals by hand, on DVD“, The Register, 27 Sep 2018).

For its part, NATO is working upon getting a new cyber military command center, which should be ready for 2023 (Robin Emmott, “NATO cyber command to be fully operational in 2023“, Reuters, 16 October 2018).

A complete and more detailed outlook would notably need to include China, should we want to provide a better global picture.

The ANSSI, from Strategy to Anticipation and Outreach

As the leader of the French cybersecurity strategy, the ANSSI aims at achieving five main goals (website):

  1. Defence of the fundamental national interest in cyberspace.
  2. Promoting cyperspace usage and protect citizens, with a strong response against any type of cybercrime.
  3. Raising digital security awareness.
  4. Transforming digital security into a competitive advantage for French economic actors.
  5. Strengthening international influence [shaping norms, promoting cyber global stability, promoting European autonomy – my summary].

Furthermore, the ANSSI must have a strong strategic foresight and anticipatory activity across all timeframes to be able to provide for the security of the new emerging world, while also dealing with the very concrete threats and risks of the present. Indeed, for example, among many other impacts, quantum computing will completely unsettle the safe transmission of data, while cities and companies abundantly using artificial intelligence in its deep learning component will need to be secured. Quantum communication work, for example, at creating quantum networks, upon which could be built in the future a quantum internet (Edd Gent, “From Quantum Computing to a Quantum Internet—A Roadmap“, SingularityHub, 22 October 2018). Quantum computing, or more largely quantum technologies, and AI, both accelerating and disrupting each other, as we saw (“The Coming Quantum Computing Disruption, Artificial Intelligence and Geopolitics (1)”, 15 October 2018), will create completely new cyber challenges that need to be envisioned and for which states’ agencies, companies, and citizens must be prepared.

The videos below, notably when seen together, may help us imagine what the future and its security could look like (trailer of Person of Interest Season 4 by J.J. Abrahams; NVIDIA GTC China 2017 Keynote Recap, notably the part on smart cities).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2a55OLQOqF0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKL4wDTmtc0

Meanwhile, the adverse multi-dimensional impacts of climate change spread and intensify, the consequences on cybersecurity must also be considered.

As underlined by the Sénat,

“One of the axis selected in the strategy of the ANSSI for the 2016-2020 period, “knowledge and anticipation” has as aim to reinforce the capacity to undertake foresight efforts, to anticipate new threats and to favour the emergence of new technologies or new uses which could have an impact in terms of cyber security”  (“Projet de loi de finances pour 2018 : Direction de l’action du Gouvernement : Coordination du travail gouvernemental“,  23 Novembre 2017)

In this framework, the ANSSI started an original outreach programme, the Agora 41, where 41 experts were selected and invited to participate in a new experiment at thinking out of the box and across disciplines to support the agency in its mission.

Five themes were selected to serve the achievement of the cyber strategy and its goals, while obeying to the strategic foresight necessity.

  1. Imagining the Cyber-World and its Security
  2. Enter the GAFA and the BATX: New rules for a new game on a new board?
  3. Winning the Talents’ War
  4. Cyber-cohabitation
  5. Enabling a Victorious Cyber-Ecosystem for Security

Each member of Agora 41 chose one core theme, while also having the possibility to interact on other issues. This system aims at allowing for more fruitful discussions and maximum feedbacks across questions.

Together these enabling efforts could help shape not only the future cybersecurity but also our very cyber future.

* It is near impossible from outside to precisely evaluate the ANSSI’s budget considering its “limited budgetary autonomy” within the Prime Minister’s Secrétariat général de la défense et de la sécurité nationale – SGDSN (“Projet de loi de finances pour 2018 : Direction de l’action du Gouvernement : Coordination du travail gouvernemental“,  23 Novembre 2017). As pointed out by the Sénat (Solutions Numériques, “ANSSI : un rapport sénatorial préconise d’élargir son autonomie de gestion budgétaire”, 19 April 2018), this partial  autonomy may only contribute to obscure vital needs and hinder the ANSSI’s efficiency by denying vital resources, all the more so when its missions are and will be enlarged considering the foreseeable future. Meanwhile the risk of administrative quarrels and hassle is enhanced.

Disclaimer: The author is part of the Agora 41 effort, but remains independent in her thinking, a sine qua non condition for the success of the ANSSI’s outreach initiative. The views expressed in this report represent the views and interpretations of the author, unless otherwise stated. This article does not imply policy, program or regulatory endorsement by the ANSSI.

Featured Image: The Argonne-led “Multiscale Coupled Urban Systems” project aims to help city planners better examine complex systems, understand the relationships between them and predict how changes will affect them. The ultimate goal is to help officials identify the best solutions to benefit urban communities. (Image by Argonne National Laboratory.)

EN
FR ZH EN