Editorial

The last issue for 2006 includes a paper on propaganda, two on deception and another on the state of Belgian intelligence agencies. Taylor starts by outlining and critiquing the West’s propaganda effort after illustrating its past. A renowned expert in this area, it would be interesting to see some comments about his assertions from readers. In the first paper on deception Yuill, Denning, and Feer posit a model for deceptive hiding. The second paper on this topic is by Brumley, Kopp, and Korb who examine the orientation stage of the OODA loop and its relationship to deception and self-deception. Vanhorenbeeck closes this issue with an evaluation of Belgian and European intelligence services.

It is pleasing to see such distinguished academics contributing to the journal. Please keep the papers coming in.  Your contributions help keep the Information Operations community informed of work going on around the globe. The authors provide this service and I hope they continue to do so.

Bill Hutchinson

November, 2006

Email: w.hutchinson@ecu.edu.au

 Table of Contents

Paper 1: Strategic Communications and the Relationship between Governmental ‘Information’ Activities in the Post 9/11 World

P.M. Taylor

Paper 2: Using Deception to Hide Things from Hackers:

Processes, Principles, and Techniques

J.Yuill, D. Denning, and F. Feer

Paper 3: Causes and Effects of Perception Errors

L. Brumley, C. Kopp and K. Korb  

Paper 4: Belgium’s intelligence community: new challenges and opportunities

M.Vanhorenbeeck

 About the Authors

Lachlan Brumley graduated from Monash University, Melbourne with a Bachelor of Software Engineering.  He is a doctoral student studying the effects of various perception errors on evolving life forms.

Dorothy Denning is Professor of Defense Analysis at the Naval Postgraduate School .  She is author of Information Warfare and Security, and the recipient of several awards.

Fred Feer is retired from a career with the U.S. Army counterintelligence, CIA, RAND and independent consulting.  Deception has been an interest and area of professional specialization for over 40 years.

Carlo Kopp graduated from the University of Western Australia , in Electrical Engineering. He completed a research Masters in Computer Science in 1996, and a PhD in 1999. His research interests include long range microwave data links, airborne ad hoc digital networks, strategy, doctrine and fundamentals of information warfare.

Kevin B. Korb is a Reader in the Clayton School of Information Technology, Monash University, Australia . His research concentrates on machine learning and the philosophy of science and the interrelation between the two, and especially the automation of causal discovery. He is co-author (with Ann Nicholson) of Bayesian Artificial Intelligence, (2004)

Philip Taylor is Distinguished Visiting Professor in the Faculty of Media and Communications, UiTM, Shah Alam, 2006, Professor of International Communications at the Institute of Communications Studies, Leeds University, UK, and Fellow of the Centre for Public Diplomacy, University of Southern California. He is the author of numerous works on information operations and propaganda.

Maarten Vanhorenbeeck is currently undertaking a Masters degree in Information Security and Intelligence at Edith Cowan University, Australia . He is a Service Delivery Manager with global information security services specialist Cybertrust.

Jim Yuill is a PhD candidate in the Computer Science Department at North Carolina State University .  His thesis is on deception for computer security.  Jim previously worked at IBM in operating systems development.