Assessing the Socio-economic Impacts of Secure Texting and Anti-Jamming Technologies in Non-Cooperative Networks

TL;DR

This paper introduces two open-source simulation models to evaluate the socio-economic impacts of secure texting and anti-jamming strategies in non-cooperative 5G networks, aiding decision-making through probabilistic analysis.

Contribution

It presents novel simulation tools for assessing socio-economic impacts of secure communication methods in untrusted networks, filling a gap in impact analysis methods.

Findings

Estimated economic losses for military sectors up to US$300 per 1,000 texts.

Probabilistic models demonstrate varying impacts based on transmission strategies.

Open-source code enables reproducibility and further research.

Abstract

Operating securely over 5G (and legacy) infrastructure is a challenge. In non-cooperative networks, malicious actors may try to decipher, block encrypted messages, or specifically jam wireless radio systems. Such activities can disrupt operations, from causing minor inconvenience, through to fully paralyzing the functionality of critical infrastructure. While technological mitigation measures do exist, there are very few methods capable of assessing the socio-economic impacts from different mitigation strategies. This leads to a lack of robust evidence to inform cost-benefit analysis, and thus support decision makers in industry and government. Consequently, this paper presents two open-source simulation models for assessing the socio-economic impacts of operating in untrusted non-cooperative networks. The first focuses on using multiple non-cooperative networks to transmit a message. The second model simulates a case where a message is converted into alternative plain language to avoid detection, separated into different portions and then transmitted over multiple non-cooperative networks. A probabilistic simulation of the two models is performed for a 15 km by 15 km spatial grid with 5 untrusted non-cooperative networks and intercepting agents. The results are used to estimate economic losses for private, commercial, government and military sectors. The highest probabilistic total losses for military applications include US$300, US$150, and US$75, incurred for a 1, 3 and 5 site multi-transmission approach, respectively, for non-cooperative networks when considering 1,000 texts being sent. These results form a framework for deterministic socio-economic impact analysis of using non-cooperative networks and secure texting as protection against radio network attacks. The simulation data and the open-source codebase is provided for reproducibility.