IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/asseca/v11y2024i3p345-375.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Drafting a Cybersecurity Standard for Outer Space Missions: On Critical Infrastructure, China, and the Indispensability of a Global Inclusive Approach

Author

Listed:
  • Riccardo Vecellio Segate

Abstract

Despite limited progress within international institutions, the need for articulating a regulatory framework for cyber operations in outer space is becoming a pressing concern. One precondition for regulation is to share cybersecurity and outer-space common terminology that can inform the negotiation of standards, policies and laws. While the UN Institute for Disarmament Research has recently issued a baseline policy glossary, binding technical definitions are missing, and the lack of a binding international cybersecurity regime adds to the obsolescence of a binding outer-space regime tracing back to half a century ago. As the IEEE SA embarks on the drafting of the first-ever technical standard for cybersecure-by- design outer-space missions, scoping and conceptual challenges abound. Technical standards are US-centred, non-binding, engineering-intensive exercises, where lawyers and Asian jurisdictions are only marginally involved; nevertheless, as China’s framework for cybersecurity is refined and its involvement in outer-space policing deepens, its disengagement from Western-driven standard-setting bodies appears unsustainable. Drawing on the specific challenge of defining what makes a cyber system ‘mission-critical’, I expose the necessity to examine how domestic cybersecurity laws from a diverse range of States identify ‘critical’ information infrastructure. Generalising therefrom, I advocate a jurisdictionally inclusive process that combines American supremacy in technical standard-setting for outer-space missions with Chinese normative contributions to cybersecurity regulation, including on data localisation and mandatory multilevel cyber-hygiene requirements. I further argue that involving legal experts from a diverse range of jurisdictions and sociolegal cultures may enhance the global reception of standardisation outputs, thus securing higher degrees of voluntary compliance therewith. This could foster cooperation and promote regional and global satellite cybersecurity.

Suggested Citation

  • Riccardo Vecellio Segate, 2024. "Drafting a Cybersecurity Standard for Outer Space Missions: On Critical Infrastructure, China, and the Indispensability of a Global Inclusive Approach," Journal of Asian Security and International Affairs, , vol. 11(3), pages 345-375, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:asseca:v:11:y:2024:i:3:p:345-375
    DOI: 10.1177/23477970241261432
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/23477970241261432
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/23477970241261432?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Andersdotter, Amelia & Olejnik, Lukasz, 2021. "Policy strategies for value-based technology standards," Internet Policy Review: Journal on Internet Regulation, Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society (HIIG), Berlin, vol. 10(3), pages 1-26.
    2. Robert Collett, 2021. "Understanding cybersecurity capacity building and its relationship to norms and confidence building measures," Journal of Cyber Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 6(3), pages 298-317, September.
    3. Courtney J. Fung, 2022. "China’s use of rhetorical adaptation in development of a global cyber order: a case study of the norm of the protection of the public core of the internet," Journal of Cyber Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 7(3), pages 256-274, September.
    4. Cantero Gamito, Marta, 2023. "The influence of China in AI governance through standardisation," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 47(10).
    5. Tai Ming Cheung, 2018. "The rise of China as a cybersecurity industrial power: balancing national security, geopolitical, and development priorities," Journal of Cyber Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 3(3), pages 306-326, September.
    6. Stacie Hoffmann & Dominique Lazanski & Emily Taylor, 2020. "Standardising the splinternet: how China’s technical standards could fragment the internet," Journal of Cyber Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 5(2), pages 239-264, May.
    7. Mavroidis, Petros C. & Wolfe, Robert, 2017. "Private Standards and the WTO: Reclusive No More," World Trade Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 16(1), pages 1-24, January.
    8. Walid Tijerina, 2022. "Industrial policy and governments’ cybersecurity capacity: a tale of two developments?," Journal of Cyber Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 7(2), pages 194-212, May.
    9. Juan Alberto Ruiz Casado, 2024. "The Interaction between Global Privilege and the Discursive Construction of the ‘China Threat’ in the ‘New Cold War’," Journal of Asian Security and International Affairs, , vol. 11(1), pages 7-26, March.
    10. Frédérick Douzet & Aude Gery, 2021. "Cyberspace is used, first and foremost, to wage wars: proliferation, security and stability in cyberspace," Journal of Cyber Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 6(1), pages 96-113, January.
    11. Sarah Backman, 2023. "Normal cyber accidents," Journal of Cyber Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 8(1), pages 114-130, January.
    12. Bryan James Nakayama, 2022. "Information vs the cyberspace domain," Journal of Cyber Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 7(2), pages 213-229, May.
    13. Robert Siudak, 2022. "Cybersecurity discourses and their policy implications," Journal of Cyber Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 7(3), pages 318-335, September.
    14. Eva Claessen, 2020. "Reshaping the internet – the impact of the securitisation of internet infrastructure on approaches to internet governance: the case of Russia and the EU," Journal of Cyber Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 5(1), pages 140-157, July.
    15. Kavallieratos, Georgios & Katsikas, Sokratis, 2023. "An exploratory analysis of the last frontier: A systematic literature review of cybersecurity in space," International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection, Elsevier, vol. 43(C).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Pohle, Julia & Voelsen, Daniel, 2022. "Das Netz und die Netze. Vom Wandel des Internets und der globalen digitalen Ordnung [The net and the networks. Transformations of the Internet and the global digital order]," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 32(3), pages 455-487.
    2. Sergei Guriev & Daniel Treisman, 2019. "Informational Autocrats," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 33(4), pages 100-127, Fall.
    3. Cantero Gamito, Marta, 2023. "The influence of China in AI governance through standardisation," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 47(10).
    4. Radu, Roxana & Kettemann, Matthias C. & Meyer, Trisha & Shahin, Jamal, 2021. "Normfare: Norm entrepreneurship in internet governance," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 45(6).
    5. Sebastian Klotz, 2023. "Who drives the international standardisation of telecommunication and digitalisation? Introducing a new data set," Global Policy, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 14(3), pages 558-568, June.
    6. David Weyrauch & Thomas Winzen, 2021. "Internet Fragmentation, Political Structuring, and Organizational Concentration in Transnational Engineering Networks," Global Policy, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 12(1), pages 51-65, February.
    7. Frieden, Rob, 2022. "Why has multilateral space and spectrum resource management become more difficult?," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 46(10).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:asseca:v:11:y:2024:i:3:p:345-375. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.