The stakes are high: China’s dominance in data collection and analysis poses a critical threat to national security, particularly in the Indo-Pacific. Experts joined Veilant (formerly Ridgeline International) on a panel to share critical insights on this pressing issue.

Read Defense One’s coverage of the conversation in their article, “China is already dominating the data war in the Pacific, experts say,” where Veilant’s Michael Stokes, VP of Strategic Engagements and Marketing, and Rob Christian, Defense Growth and BD Lead, provided their perspective on this topic.

The challenge of open data and ubiquitous surveillance is particularly relevant in the Pacific, where Rob Christian, the former command chief warrant officer for 311th Signal Command, pointed out that China “is the largest technically advanced enemy we’ve ever seen and could imagine, and they also own the majority of the infrastructure.”

Twenty years ago, operators could use burner phones, get local SIM cards, or even turn phones off to “hide in the noise.” But “hiding in the noise now is much more difficult when you think about the layer of AI and analytics on top of things that are out there and all the stuff we’ve dumped out there through our travels,” Christian said. “I think the challenge is slowly kind of morphing into, ‘OK, you’ve got to project, but you’ve also got to protect’.”

Panel moderator Mike Stokes, vice president of strategic engagements and marketing for [Veilant], called the issue one of “digital signature warfare.”

“It’s almost its own domain, where we need to think about the adversary’s capabilities to collect on us and our ability to counter those threats as its own doctrine and policy,” Stokes said.

…So what can commanders do? Christian suggested they “train and try…and then let yourself be exposed and fail forward, because that’s the only way your troops are gonna learn.”