Engineer

Cyberspace is clearly the buzzword of the day. As the Air Force moves forward with its vision to fly and fight in cyberspace, however, there are some emerging misperceptions about what warfighting in this new domain actually means. Depending on how you define or interpret cyberspace determines what you think warfighting in the domain will look like. Rather than engage in a debate on how we should define cyberspace, this article uses the definition of cyberspace recently adopted by the Department of Defense and the Air Force to address two common misperceptions about cyber warfare. The Department of Defense officially codified its understanding of cyberspace as a warfighting domain with the publication of the National Military Strategy for Cyberspace Operations. HYPERLINK http//www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/wrightstuff/cyberspace_defined_wrightstuff_17may07.htm l _ftn1_ftn1 o In this document, cyberspace is defined as a domain characterized by the use of electronics and the electromagnetic spectrum to store, modify, and exchange data via networked systems and associated physical infrastructures. According to this definition, cyberspace is a very real, physical domain that is comprised of electronics and networked systems that use electromagnetic energy. Cyberspace exists across the other domains of air, land, sea, and space and connects these physical domains with the cognitive processes that use the data that is stored, modified, or exchanged. Cyberspace is therefore distinct from the information that may be resident in or transferred through the domain. Using this understanding of cyberspace, the following sections discuss misperceptions about the boundaries of the domain and operations conducted in the domain. There is a wide range of thoughts about the extent of cyberspace or what should be included in cyber warfare. A typical response to What is cyberspace usually involves some description of computer networks or the internet. For the more network savvy,