Digital battlefields, hybrid warfare, and the future of threat intelligence
IDST Intelligence Briefings
(Latest Security & Cyber Videos)
Why This Magazine Exists
Security, Cyber & Counter-Threats examines the evolving landscape of modern security in an era defined by digital conflict, hybrid warfare, and persistent global threats.
From cyber operations, information warfare, and intelligence-driven defense to counter-terrorism, internal security, and emerging threat vectors, this magazine provides strategic analysis, technical insight, and policy-relevant perspectives for decision-makers, practitioners, and researchers navigating an increasingly contested security environment.
What We Track
- Cyber warfare & cyber defense
- Information operations & influence campaigns
- National security threat assessments
- Emerging digital and hybrid warfare doctrines
- Critical infrastructure & cyber resilience
Latest Analysis & Intelligence
-
Deep Space Optical Communications: Breaking the Radio Barrier and Building a Laser-Powered Solar System Network
Introduction: Strategic Context — The Next Revolution in Space Communications For more than six decades, radio-frequency (RF) communications have provided the essential connection between Earth and spacecraft exploring the Moon, Mars, and the outer solar system. NASA’s Deep Space Network (DSN), supported by large antennas in California, Spain, and Australia, remains a critical element of…
-
Locking Away Carbon: Innovations in Carbon Storage Technologies for a Climate-Resilient Future
Strategic Context The carbon challenge is entering a new phase. The question is no longer simply how quickly the world can reduce emissions, but whether it can permanently remove and safely store enough carbon dioxide to deal with residual emissions from industries that are difficult to decarbonize. Carbon capture and storage has consequently moved from…
-
The Global Main Battle Tank Industry: Reinvention, Drone Warfare, and the Race for Next-Generation Armoured Dominance
Introduction: Strategic Context — The Tank at a Turning Point The main battle tank (MBT) is undergoing its most consequential reassessment since the introduction of composite armour, thermal imaging, and modern fire-control systems. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has exposed the vulnerability of armoured vehicles to persistent surveillance, first-person-view (FPV) drones, loitering munitions, precision artillery, and…
-
Coilguns: The Rise of Electromagnetic Weapons and the Future of Electrified Warfare
Strategic Context For more than a century, firearms have depended on essentially the same fundamental mechanism: chemical energy stored in a propellant is rapidly converted into pressure, accelerating a projectile through a barrel. The emergence of practical electromagnetic launch technologies raises a different question: what happens when the battlefield weapon becomes an electrical machine rather…
-
Wearable Batteries: The New Power Architecture for Soldiers, Autonomous Systems and Smart Devices
Strategic Context The next generation of military and civilian electronics is being constrained by an increasingly familiar problem: power has become a mobility problem. Soldiers now carry radios, night-vision systems, thermal imagers, navigation devices, tactical computers, electronic-warfare equipment, drone controllers and other networked sensors, all of which compete for limited battery capacity. A typical infantry…
-
DARPA EQUIP-A-Pharma: The Future of On-Demand Drug Manufacturing for Military Readiness and National Health Security
Introduction: Strategic Context — Pharmaceutical Supply Chains as a National Security Vulnerability Modern military operations depend on a reliable supply of pharmaceuticals, from essential antibiotics and pain medications to treatments for chronic conditions and emergency medical countermeasures. Yet pharmaceutical supply chains remain exposed to concentrated manufacturing capacity, dependence on overseas suppliers and precursor chemicals, transportation…
-
Direct Satellite-to-Mobile Connectivity: The Race to Turn Smartphones into Global Network Terminals
Introduction: From Cell Towers to a Hybrid Space-Earth Network What if the next major expansion of the mobile network does not require another cell tower? Direct satellite-to-mobile, commonly referred to as Direct-to-Device (D2D), connectivity is moving from an experimental concept toward an important new layer of global communications infrastructure. Instead of requiring dedicated satellite phones…
STRATEGIC SUB-MAGAZINES
Modern military power emerges from the interaction of platforms, people, doctrine, and integration across domains. The Defense & Military Systems magazine is structured into focused sub-magazines that examine how combat capability is built, sustained, and employed across air, land, sea, weapons, and human systems.
Cyber & Information Warfare
Industrial outcomes are shaped as much by incentives, policy, and market structure as by engineering. Price signals, investment cycles, and regulatory frameworks quietly determine which technologies scale, stagnate, or fail.
This sub-magazine examines how markets behave under strategic pressure—where capital flows, how demand signals distort decisions, and why some industries adapt faster than others.
Explore the Cyber & Information Warfare Sub-Magazine →
Security & Threat Management
Modern security is defined by persistence, coordination, and anticipation. This sub-magazine focuses on how threats are identified, mitigated, and managed across institutions, infrastructures, and societies.
Explore the Security & Threat Management Sub-Magazine →