Distributed Space/Ground Network Centric Operations Research Testbed Lunar6 Distributed Space/Ground Network Centric Operations Research Testbed

Approach Industry/Academia/NASA combined space network testbeds Protocol Development Allow Academia and Industry to develop the protocols Allow NASA to concentrate on reliable flight hardware/software implementation Aerospace Communication and Network Engineer development (for NASA and DoD) Include NASA Operations Personnel Human Factors Social Factors Protocol Development and Deployment (including operational experience) Internet Protocol version 6 Delay/Disruption Tolerant Networking International Collaboration on protocol development (DTN bone) bundle agent discovery for space International Interoperability Sharing of resources (ground stations, relays) Automated Scheduling (NASA, ESA, JAXA, commercial) Network Security (Securely Combining Networks where appropriate) Security International Operations ITAR (And the foreign state equivalent) Store-and-Forward (data at rest) Key and Policy distribution Operations and operational deployment Issues– particularly manned operations Voice Loops (audio multiplexing) Multicast commanding during launch (flood routing) Off-Nominal operations Unidirectional links Radio Cross-strapping (addressing and security considerations) Routing Network Addressing Networks in Motion (nemo), a mobile IP based routing mechanism Mobile Ad Hoc Networks (manet) Standard routing mechanisms (OSPF, RIP, etc)

Testbed Monitoring and Human Factors Anomaly Implementation and Control Network Distributed NCO Testbed (All Operations over Emulated Links!)

Rules of Engagement One is only allowed to command, control, communicate, and update systems over the links expected in space Failures will be injected into systems to experiment with recovery techniques; Failures will be implemented over an anomaly control network independent of the communications network Failure modes could be recommended by NASA Operations personnel A separate high-rate human factors monitoring network could be put into place to monitor the people working on configuring and trouble-shooting the communications network.. This would provide interesting information on human factors. Such information would be invaluable to NASA. The various systems will even be place in remote locations such as different universities.

Distributed Testbed (Notional) Case Western Reserve University of Southern California Florida State New Hampsire Washington State Keio University Université de Toulouse Carnegie Mellon University Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) Relay Satellite Communications Satellite Lunar Base Station Controls: University of Houston, Cleveland State Psychology: Harvard, Yale, Stanford Tracking Station Flight Test Facility Launch Site Ground Station Control Center

Skill Sets NASA has numerous excellent communication engineers. Excellent understanding of point-to-point radio communications. Generally have very little knowledge of how the radio system affects the upper layers of the protocol stack, the networking, transport, security, and applications. NASA has numerous excellent terrestrial networking engineers. Some of these engineers even understand network security. It is an extremely rare individual that understands the interaction of radio systems and networks. These individuals reside on the networking side simply because at some point they are forced to understand why protocols are not working as expected. It is even rarer to find an individual that understands the interaction of radio systems, networking and security. This skill set needs to be developed and is also greatly needed by DoD.

Example Problems Who controls the key management and distribution? Where does this system reside? How are keys distributed? Who controls security policy management and distribution? Where does this system reside? How is policy distributed? What are the hardware systems reset policies? One may suspect that they will be different for manned spacecraft versus unmanned spacecraft. Do I have a back-channel for when I lock myself out of a system either by misconfigured security policy or misconfigured static routing or misconfigured radios? Is that back channel via a virtual circuit of a different radio system? One may suspect that this will be different for manned spacecraft versus unmanned spacecraft. Do I always have to encrypt my RF links, or during off-nominal operations can I revert to unencrypted links? Is this network to operate only in the closed IONET or should the design allow for International operations – this highly effects implementation and security. What risks is NASA willing to take regarding flight hardware and software certification for manned and unmanned operations? Do I need 24/7 communication for manned missions, or do we need to learn how to operated in autonomously?

Items Requiring Immediate Attention Off-nominal voice-over-IP concepts Domain Named Services in space environments Security Certificate and Policy management and distribution in space environment Utility of Delay/Disruption Tolerant Networking for Space Deployment of Multicasting in extreme environments for commanding (effectively flood routing) The utility (or lack thereof) of Policy-base routing in multi-homed systems Blind Commanding Predictive Routing Security, Security, Security Dynamic Routing in space (including MANET) Mobile-IP for space Effects of delays and bit-error-rates on various protocols – particularly with an IPsec security overlay Utility of various radio systems Robust communication hardware architectures (what is the most robust way to put together antennas, up/down-converters, interface cards, routing devices and security hardware).

Conceptual Lunar Communications Architecture How does one address (IP addresses) this network? Who controls the addresses?

International Interoperability It’s all about security! Today’s NASA claims International Interoperability For the most part it is at the data-link layer and below Or, at the Federal Express layer. Mission Planning and Scheduling service must be implemented. A framework for such exists as part of the SLE, but has more to do with scheduling assets than extending the space link. Full interoperability means forward and return data is actually transmitted though systems owned and operated by various entities This has an enormous security implications