JOC-COVI, a multi-domain oriented information ecosystem

With the advent and growing potential of digital tools, access to information today is, more than ever before, a decisive resource for effective orientation within all everyday contexts. The so-called “infobesity” highlights the pervasive nature of data within a continuous and uncontrolled flow of information and also impacts the applications used for Defence. For the Armed Forces, this dynamic takes the form of new challenges linked to the evolution of threats (now hybrid rather than conventional), the emergence of multi-domain scenarios, and the growing centrality of the cyber component.

The achievement of Information Superiority thus becomes a strategic matter, leading to a need to use ever-more sophisticated and innovative systems for data collection, analysis and dissemination that can aggregate not just military but also context-related information. To achieve these objectives, Leonardo has developed the Joint Operation Centre (JOC) to support the Italian Command for Joint Operations (Comando Operativo di Vertice Interforze - COVI) in its functions of planning, coordinating and conducting both national and extranational operations that impact all operational domains.

The JOC-COVI programme aims to strengthen the Joint Operations Headquarters’ operational capabilities in terms of flexibility, speed, effectiveness, and efficiency by creating an info-ecosystem powered—or primed for future integration—by advanced and highly innovative technologies such as artificial intelligence, and deep learning that enable multi-domain and multi-class connections.

The JOC comprises multiple components that carry out mutually complementary functions to become a tool that supports multi-domain contexts: the Joint Common Operational Picture (JCOP), which gathers information from different military sources to provide a complete situational awareness; the PMESII (Political, Military, Economic, Social, Infrastructural and Informational) system for analysing the political, military, economic, social, infrastructural and information scenarios pertaining to a geographical area of interest in the performance of an operational mission (context awareness); the Information Knowledge Management (IKM) system, which optimises the relationships between technologies, processes, people and policies to support COVI in understanding the context and in mission planning; and the Space Management System (SMS), developed to support the Space Operations Command (Comando Operazioni Spaziali - COS) in aggregating and representing the status of all Defence Space assets.

The four souls of the Joint Operation Centre

The first component of the JOC is the Joint Common Operational Picture, a system that supports operators in decision-making processes. It acts as the essential fulcrum in achieving Shared Situational Awareness (SA) offering operations headquarters and their staff with essential tools to gather accurate, complete and up-to-date information on the status of operations that are taking place.

Thanks to this type of technology, the JOC can operate automatically, integrating information from the operational Command and Control (C2) systems of the Italian Army, Navy and Air Force and the systems used by Network Operations Command (Comando Operazioni in Rete - COR), which operates in the cyber domain, and Space Operations Command (COS) as well as other sources (for example NATO), aggregating data and optimising information to create a real-time updated JCOP extended to all operational domains.

The main characteristic - and the added value of the JOC - is that the Joint Common Operational Picture is enriched with context-based information, not of a purely military nature, such as weather conditions or satellite configuration, or from the fields of politics, the economy and society. Some of this information are gathered automatically from both open (Open-Source Intelligence) and non-open sources through the second component of the JOC, the PMESII system. This is an application designed for in-depth analysis and comprehension of the operational environment in complex, dynamic, and changing contexts. It can provide information superiority in military and strategic operations. PMESII uses advanced algorithms and analytical processes to search, categorise, process and dynamically visualise information. The methodology employed describes the operational environment by subdividing it into six main “domains”: Political, Military, Economic, Social, Information and Infrastructure (PMESII). These are crossed in a matrix with an equal number of categories—Areas, Structures, Capabilities, Organisation, People, and Events (ASCOPE)—to analyse the environment of a specific operational context and obtain a detailed and organised context-based information picture.

An essential part of the process is the automatic collection and analysis of data from open sources, such as social media or the web, whose functionalities are fully built into the PMESII software. Through a complex analytical process, assisted by semantic analysis and reaction analysis algorithms, the system highlights connections between the different data collected (also in the form of multimedia content), and transforms them into high-value information used to support COVI decision-making process.

The third component of the JOC is Information Knowledge Management, a system designed to aggregate and manage all information (military and context-based) and continuously supply the JCOP to ensure information superiority in highly complex contexts. This tool enables personnel to create reports on the various aspects of a mission, such as logistical and operational aspects. It is strategic both at the context comprehension stage and in the mission’s planning, since it assists in understanding the objectives and assets, military and otherwise (e.g. logistics, fuel, medical aspects), needed to complete an operation. The IKM system thus makes planning activities more efficient and reduces the time needed to produce information reports, enabling decision makers to make the best decisions quickly.

The fourth component is the Space Management System, which was designed to provide the JCOP with Situational Awareness and complete and strategic support in the management, control, and execution of activities in the Space domain. The platform aims to optimise processes and support Space Operations Command (COS). For this purpose, it supports the creation and management of operational scenarios, which are essential for conducting analyses and calculations on objects in Space within a defined time frame. It has a centralised and constantly updated database of the Catalogue of Space Objects, which can be viewed in 3D.

Thanks to these tools and technologies, COVI now has an info-structure with highly technological stations designed to achieve information superiority in highly complex multi-domain contexts.

Information sharing and future scenarios

Italian regulations for the management of classified information are very stringent. They enforce segregation between domains (national, NATO, EU, mission) and between security classification levels (unclassified, confidential, secret) and physical separation in the transfer of information. While maintaining the distinction between classified and unclassified information during this phase, the JOC overcomes the distinction between domains. This enables operators to move rapidly from one domain to another, manage missions in different domains almost simultaneously, and receive information from different domains.

Currently, information is transmitted from the C2 systems of the different Armed Forces to the JOC by direct line over the Defence networks according to a hierarchical architecture. In the future, the Defence Cloud will become a full-fledged strategic enabler. This is an infrastructure that will enable the creation of a multi-domain and multi-level data lake that can host, manage, and correlate all data from the Armed Forces—not only at the Command and Control level but also that of the Armed Forces’ sensors, actuators, and systems—further enriching this with contextual information like that gathered, for instance, by the PMESII system. In this way, anyone with the right and the need to access a specific information will be able to obtain the original data and aggregate it more rapidly and effectively.

From this perspective, it will be necessary to create a data lake to collect the information and strengthen the use of artificial intelligence. In an environment characterised by a myriad of data, AI-based algorithms will be indispensable for improving the quality of data and information operators require. This will enable the optimisation of decision-making processes, helping decision-makers choose the most effective reaction to perceived threats. As the quantity and types of data increase, artificial intelligence’s predictive capacity will become increasingly vital. It will show decision makers a greater number of options and pathways to take, generate simulated scenario developments, and re-examine situations that have already arisen. Human operators will always have the final decision and the responsibility to select the most appropriate response pathway. The collected data can be analysed raw, processed, and aggregated into “immediately usable data”.