Exploitation of Network-Based Information Navy SBIR FY2008.1 Sol No.: Navy SBIR FY2008.1 Topic No.: N08-081 Topic Title: Exploitation of Network-Based Information Proposal No.: N081-081-0028 Firm: 21st Century Technologies Inc. 4515 Seton Center Parkway Suite 320 Austin, Texas 78759 Contact: Robert Morgan Phone: (512) 342-0010 Web Site: www.21technologies.com Abstract: The transition of Department of Defense (DoD) infrastructure to a Net-centric Enterprise Services (NCES) architecture on a Global Information Grid (GID) is dramatically increasing the connectedness between military, civilian, and intelligence personnel and the networks they employ. With the continued adoption of networked technologies by the DoD and adversaries, it is imperative to simultaneously research and develop technology that can provide insight into the complex behavior of these networks, so as to better understand, protect, defend, monitor, and exploit the networks for strategic goals. Novel contributions are crucial in the growing field of network science that can provide rapid insight into complex behavior of GIG-NCES networks. Toward this end, 21st Century Technologies (21CT) proposes NetMetA, a solution that provides network metric analysis capabilities applicable to the sensor, computer, human communications, and intelligence networks of the GIG. Links within GIG (communication) networks are far from simple, varying over time in the communication frequency, duration, and quantity of information exchanged. NetMetA specifically considers these critically important aspects of communication links in seeking to 1) extract relevant metrics of communication activity, 2) classify the behavior of network entities and their relationships according to common profiles, and 3) identify and measure global communication pathways. Benefits: The NetMetA Phase I research effort will result in a proof-of-concept that will lay the foundation for developing tools and techniques which will be useful in understanding the complex behavior of networks that arise in GIG and NCES environments. Ultimately, the research developed in NetMeta will enable the examination specifically of communication methods to observe how they are different from other networks and provide new research and metrics in this area. The NetMetA capability will enable the automated identification of the most significant information pathways within a given network, and it will enable the quantitative comparison of pathways within and across networks. The ultimate goal of NetMetA is to research new metrics and analyze current metrics differently from traditional methods in order to enable automated identification of key information propagation pathways which identify possible places for interception or a need for protection. NetMetA's ability to identify paths through networks will provide a sequence through communication networks to find out how information flows by identifying common behavior profiles and significant global communication pathways. While current network science provides a static picture of the communication activity that is possible or that may have occurred, NetMetA will capture and analyze actual communication activity. Added benefits include a contribution toward furthering research in network science as well as the ability to understand complex networks. Return