EP 043 Chris Cubbage 'Space Security', Protecting Our Critical Infrastructure In Space

Chris Cubbage

Director and Executive Editor 

With over 30 years experience, Chris is a leading security and technology journalist and a multi-certified security professional (CPP, CISA, GAICD) with a formative 15 years policing background, including as a Homicide Detective and Australian Crime Commission Senior Investigator. Chris is author of Corporate Security in the Asia Pacific Region, Security Risk Management in Corporate Governance and publisher of Cyber Risk Leaders by Shamane Tan. Chris is host of MySec.TV, Cyber Security Weekly Podcast, Australia in Space TV and editor of the Australian Cyber Security Magazine, Cyber Risk Leaders Magazine and Australia in Space Magazine. 

Key websites

Media: www.mysecuritymedia.com

Marketplace: www.mysecuritymarketplace.com

Consulting: www.amlechouse.com

Conference: www.spaceandearthconference.com

#mysecuritytv #australiainspacetv   

Security Circle ⭕️ is an IFPOD production for IFPO the International Foundation of Protection Officers

Transcript

Yoyo: 0:14

Hi, this is Yolanda. Welcome. Welcome to the Security Circle podcast. IFPO is the International Foundation for Protection Officers and we are dedicated to providing meaningful education and certification for all levels of security personnel. and make a positive difference to our members mental health and well being. Well, I have a very special guest for you today. Honestly, the lengths we have gone to, we'll have a giggle in a bit, the lengths we've gone to, to actually get on the same time zone, because this young man is based in the Southern Hemisphere. His name is Chris Cubbage and he is a specialist in security and space industry. He is a host editor for the mysecuritymarketplace. com, MySecTV. cyber security weekly podcast. So I'm talking to a fellow podcaster, no pressure. He also participates with the cyber risk leaders magazine, the Australian cyber security magazine, Australia in space magazine, Australia in space TV, hashtag my security TV, hashtag Australian space TV. Chris Welcome to the security circle

Chris Cubbage: 1:21

podcast. Yo, thank you very much for having me and it's good to be on this side. I'll just sit here and relax rather than asking those questions. You're right. It may be a bit more, nerves involved with a fellow podcaster, but well done on what you're doing. Do you know,

Yoyo: 1:36

I learned to be a better listener doing this. So I don't know if you have a very similar,

Chris Cubbage: 1:42

experience. Very much so. You're always thinking of the next question as they're talking, but you're still trying to listen and it's an ongoing learning process. You're speaking to specialists from around the world in their own domain and you're just constantly learning. So, I think I said when I first met you it's addictive once you start. So, be careful. I

Yoyo: 2:03

don't know. I just think I've got this curiosity for learning, and doing this job. And it's not a job, but doing it kind of... It satisfies that part of my brain that wants to learn and talk to interesting people, you know, why do you do it?

Chris Cubbage: 2:18

I think that, I think when you rattle off all those channels that we cover it's all evolved I've been doing the media side since 2010 and it has all evolved. We started just with one Channel and then evolved into the Asia Pacific security magazine. But that actually came from an idea to do a Hong Kong security magazine. Cause we had someone who could speak Mandarin and Cantonese working with us at the time. We thought, okay, we could break into the Hong Kong market. But Hong Kong was then seen when we spoke to the industry was too small. So we expanded out to Asia Pacific. And then that became, you know, we started looking at, you know, when you cover off in the security sector, you start looking at other critical technologies and how they relate drones, robotics we'll touch on space, but obviously cybersecurity we cover electronics, CCTV, video systems. So. Any channel that we have, and we have a lot, we always joke, we've got 16. We've actually got more. We've lost count of how many websites and channels we have, but I come in at from either one, I want to know more or two. I see there's a relationship there or a interdependence on what we do. And I try to cover it because I want to learn. More about it. And that's exactly what motivates me as well. There's no one expert out there. No one knows everything. Anyone who says that they do red flag. So, and it's also almost like a the media is like a personal diary for what. Has interest me on any given day. So if you look at all our content I can at least go back and go, okay, I remember when that came in and I don't know the details. I probably don't read it all, but I know it's relevant. And so, it's a sort of a tag web page there that I can always go back to.

Yoyo: 4:06

Well, look, let's satisfy the curious minds listening. And I have to ask you the first question. What is the, what does cybersecurity have to do with space, Chris?

Chris Cubbage: 4:17

Well, everything. I mean, space is a critical sector, critical infrastructure sector. You think about upstream, downstream we wouldn't have GPS and location positioning without space related systems. And they're very much data driven. Communication platforms and data transfer platforms. So therefore there they require cybersecurity and then they're also subject to attack Russia attacked satellite systems before it invaded Ukraine. There's a host of sort of different reasons, but also they are carrying critical data. And they're subject to jamming, interception and a whole range of different things. So yeah the two relate very much. So, and even those in the cybersecurity industry should be aware of the importance of space technology. In their own data systems, if we lose a range of communication satellites for whatever reason, whether it's a space debris incident or it's an actual space warfare incident, you're going to lose your communications. And so therefore, how, what's your resiliency to that? And how are you going to recover? So very much related to cyber security, very related, very much related to national security, very much related to critical infrastructure protection. And I've evolved into the space sector probably more so over the last few years, but I first, but when we launched these Asia Pacific security magazine Lockheed Martin, we're introducing the joint strike fighter into Australia. And so I went on a tour around America with Lockheed Martin. They did a media tour. And the first point of call was their space labs in in California. And they were just launching back then a new GPS satellite, which was some time, some of the order of, I don't know, maybe eight times, at least it might be, it'd been more. More secure against GPS jamming. So they were, you know, already in that space. So that was 2012, I think, 2013. And they were talking about the space debris problem back then. So that was my first. Interest. And when you look at a company like Lockheed Martin I think my article was from space to the subsea. So they cover every domain from space air land, and then subsurface. And that's, that really opened my eyes. I, okay, that's where it kind of dawned on me that there's a lot more involved in the. Security industry than it is just guards, guns, and gates. This is much more sophisticated. And yeah, that's how we started covering off on space. Probably just pandemic time, we started to do a Indo Pacific series. And brought in Japanese, Indian American and obviously Australian guests. And naturally you talk to the Indians and Japanese, you'd hit straight away. They're Jap they're space sectors really strongly. So yeah, we started having. Space discussions and cross industry. So cyber physical aerospace, drones, robotics, and they all rely on space related systems and communications very much. So, so increasingly. So,

Yoyo: 7:38

so I guess really then. This would extend if we go into planetary, and we start having bases on the moon, and we start having bases on Mars, then the same kind of geopolitics is going to be at play, and the same protecting critical national infrastructure will be at play too.

Chris Cubbage: 7:56

Absolutely, and it's driving it at the moment, the geopolitics is driving this, the technology is driving it as well, but yeah the... You know, you've got Russia crashing into the moon recently, India's landed on it the U. S. are heading to it we've got rovers on Mars and here in, even in Australia, we're building rovers that will be on in the Mars missions and the Artemis missions and it leads us to, you know, we're running a major conference in Perth this month the Indo Pacific Space and Earth Conference, which is bringing the cross sectors To together, agriculture, mining, sustainability, cyber security, and national security all come together when you look at a sector like space and where humanity is heading. You know, by the end of the decade, we're most likely to have a colony on the Mar on the moon and humans would have been on Mars. That's the idea. We did a session recently with the Australian National University called space medicine for earthlings, looking at whether humans should be in, in space, we're not meant to be there. We haven't evolved to be in space and you know, we even get to the point of if we're going to have a colony on Mars what's the first generation going to look like Will they, because their bone structure and their health systems won't adapt as they do under the same level of gravity that we do. So they might be taller with less strength in their bone structure. And then the question was, well, would they be able to come back to earth because the gravity won't be enough and therefore, you know, and so that's well beyond. security in space, but you know, humans, human security that falls down into in terms of the future of humanity and what we are planning to do. Yeah, it comes down to human security.

Yoyo: 9:51

In fact to your point around bone density and the first generation born off Earth, you know, that's very relative because all of our space astronauts, they have to do an awful lot of exercise in space, don't they? Because their bodies aren't fighting gravity gravity. So they're not building muscle mass and they losing a lot of muscle mass to the point where when they land back on Earth, they are too weak, aren't they? To stand up. So you're right. Imagine a generation that's born off Earth.

Chris Cubbage: 10:20

Well, even our eyes and our our eyes react differently hearing reacts differently in space. So all of this content's available on our space channels, but it's well worth have a look at Australia and space TV. That was a live panel session that we recorded with we had a philosopher, a historian to two aerospace medical doctors discussing this. It's a fascinating domain and it's not one. One level, this becomes multi level on the technology, the medical research, and then how we may well apply some of that research back to, so, you know, conditions like osteoporosis and what has, what we've learned in space about. This we've been able to bring it back and apply a new sort of medicines and applications here. And then you've also got things like robotic skeletal systems that we're building and how that might apply. We might be able to sort of counter that, that gravitational, and that might lead to new technology and. new advancements there. And then I always straight away then think, okay, we've got, cause we're building these skeletal systems for defense applications. Right. And so we're going to put them on soldiers. We'll probably put them on police. We've got you know, those kinds of things. And it will also. Lead to new robotics applications because we want to minimize humans in space. If we can, we don't want them being outside or we want them in a protected environment. And so we need to have remote operations as much as possible. And again, the use of drones, robotics, and autonomous systems will also grow exponentially. And then you need that AI and machine learning there in the background. And then you need to have really robust cybersecurity. In those platforms, because if you have a a vulnerable AI system, then you're in real trouble. So that's probably a good long answer of where space and cyber security and security meet because you need integrity. In these systems, reliability and you know, the CIA approach as well as the operational technology approach of you know, performance and safety and the others. So it's a really cool IT OT mix and IT OT cybersecurity is a really fascinating domain.

Yoyo: 12:40

So, for those that don't know, the CIA approach would be confidentiality, integrity and, availability. Availability. Three clear cyber security principles. Look, what you've just said is mind blowing, really, because, you know, if we get it wrong... It's pretty disastrous to make the first handshake in space with another potentially intelligent species an automated one to represent us as human beings. We've all seen, you know, Star Trek's the motion picture. We've seen what happens when Voyager wanted to come home. You know, it beggars belief what's out there, really, when you think about it. When you know that there are billions of galaxies, there has to be other intelligent life forming out there. And I wonder how different or similar it will be. That's a whole other conversation. But I was about, I don't know, eight years old in primary school. I first realized the gravity of where we lived because my teacher at the time, we were in a class, we were talking about the solar system. We were talking about how eventually, you know, the earth would, its life cycle would end and the sun would get really big and basically would engulf the earth and there would be no earth anymore. And I was like eight or nine. And I just thought, Oh God, things end. And that was my first, way of understanding that things aren't infinite. And I'm fortunate that I experienced it that way and not through death of a family member, for example, because I think as a child, there's lots of ways to understand that. But we really are, as Carl Sagan said, this blue dot in the middle of this huge expanse. It seems illogical, doesn't it? That we are fighting over territory here when we a small little space. That really does, as Brian Cox say, make us incredibly unique and special indeed. When are we going to

Chris Cubbage: 14:35

learn? We won't. If anyone listens to, to my podcast, my my common saying is I'm an optimistic pessimist. So generally, and that comes from my, probably my policing background is you tend to see the dark side of people and things. That common people, common might not be the right term, but normal might not be the right term either, but general, you know, general people or the public don't understand that bad things are happening and do happen and by accident or by design sometimes. So. I mean, even the projects on the moon and in Mars, they're pretty much saying there's a big sustainability drive because it's, they're saying there is new planet, same problems. And we're going to pop, you know, pollute the moon and we're going to pollute Mars with polluted space. What we've done in space is unbelievable. And, you know, the drive in space for low earth orbit. We're going to be going from around the, I mean, even just a few years ago not that long ago, there was about 800 low earth orbit satellites. It's sitting around 6, 000 now, and they anticipate by the end of the decade, 50 to 100, 000 low earth orbit satellites. So, you know, the impact that's going to have environmentally and just in the way that we all communicate from anywhere on the planet the degree of surveillance that we will have optical audio. Bye. radio frequency, we're going to have it covered. You won't be able to move without it being tracked and known. So the dystopian future that we are potentially creating and we'll do the same on Mars. You know, we're setting up, we'll set up wifi networks on Mars and the moon and you know, all that kind of stuff will be there. But, you know, going back to your point of you know, we won't last forever. I think Brian Cox mentioned that we don't know if there's other plants because civilization doesn't last long enough to find each other. And so, you know, when you think we've only been around you know, man, 50, 60, 000, I'll go back to our first nations in here in Australia. That's a long time. It's a second, you know, not even that in a lifetime. And is the universe old enough? You know, we've evolved. It's taken 13 billion years for us to evolve. It might take more and it's only by chance that we're here. So, you know, and you can bring all this back to security when you understand the principles of security of resiliency, redundancy and just general security. It is why we end up still having wars, unfortunately, Yo, because fear is a driver. Often hear that in the security industry, you know, self fear. And you know, or you wait for something bad to happen and then you want security. It's a fundamental, you know, Maslow hierarchy of having that sense of security. So it comes back to the fundamentals of who we are, the fittest and the strongest survive. So yeah it. Hence, you know, I take interest in this because when you understand humans and how they behave and then you understand security and the mindset required to apply security controls and principles yeah, they match really well. You need to understand that really to do your job in security, you come across the human side very quickly. Yeah. So that's why I take interest in security and space.

Yoyo: 18:13

There will be lots of boys and girls who wanted to be astronauts when they were kids and yet here is cyber security, which is a bit like Marmite to people. I think people either love it or they're totally terrified of it because technology moves so fast and technology is quite a hard relationship to have, right? How can you have a relationship with something that's moving all the time? Cybersecurity gives people an opportunity, doesn't it, to get more connected to that first dream of being connected with space, what's happening in space territory, space security, and cybersecurity in a way provides a gateway to, to do more things than you can ever have dreamed of. Like, I would never have thought to look up in this podcast series. As you've taught me to when I came across your profile on LinkedIn. So what can we say are the key drivers to why people should think about if they love cyber security, why would they want a career protecting our critical and national infrastructure in space?

Chris Cubbage: 19:21

Well, look, I maybe come back to the basics of its operational technology, so OT and IT, cybersecurity from a vocational viewpoint, there's a strong demand for it and it's, you know, there's a lot of opportunity there. It used to be, you know, cyber security was asked, it's technical. You've got to be a tech head to, to get into it. Whereas there's a lot of GRC sort of, approaches and requirements. And there's, they call it the hard skill, soft skill approach. And there's different terminology preferences around that. But, you know, again, I come back to you on this need to understand how humans think social social interaction, misinformation, disinformation, social manipulation, you know, there's all of that plays very heavily into cyber security. So you don't need necessarily to have tech skills, programming skills and coding is really important. But I mean, I don't code in terms of writing a whole program. You know, I. Can code in basic ways as, or I can read code, but I'm not a, an analyst or a, you know, those, but I understand the principles again and how it's applied. And I'll reach out to a, you know, a security architect if need be, or a programmer and software engineer. And you talk to them, you need to understand how they think as well. And the life cycle of their, of what they do and the workflows that they follow. You need to have an understanding of that. So I don't know what the motivation is. I think we did a women in security ASEAN regional awards this year, which is our fourth year. So these are getting women in security from across Southeast Asia and you know, they all nominate, and then we run an awards. Two of them this year you know, told the story that they used to watch movies as young girls and, you know, either crime fighting movies or the superhero movies. And you know, they were solving crime and whatever they're like, Oh, that's what I want to do. And they're both in it, but it was really interesting to two ladies from different countries. But all getting motivated in the same way, they both saw, they felt it at an early age. And I think that's the common motivation. And now they're very senior, one's a chief information security officer, and the other one's a senior security trainer both in cyber security, and living their dream, right? They're doing exactly what they want to do. And one thing I've learned with age is, you know, you just need to start and then before you know it, you're old and you've been doing it for 30 years. But yeah, you can build a career and you don't have to be defined into one role. For the rest of your career, cybersecurity is one of those domains that you'll switch roles, you'll move around, you can do analyst role, you can do, you know, incident response you can do operations. Yeah, you do operations, you can work in a sock, you can do governance, risk and compliance. You can do privacy, you can do design you know, software design software testing. You know, there's no shortage of what you can do. And I think again, and the numbers required the number of people the industry needs worldwide and the other one is it's global. That's the other thing I choose space and cyber security and security is it's global. So you can work anywhere. You can talk to anyone. In these domains from anywhere in the world. And if they're in the same industry, they understand exactly the same language. The technical side is the same. And you can have those conversations and network and have those relationships. And again, it's really good industries. And cause I came in, even when I first left the police 2005, there was still many in physical security. And I'm like, guys, you literally guys, cause there's very few women because like, why aren't you looking at computer security? You know why? Yeah. Yeah. This was an industry. These are the industry associations just pigeonholed and siloed into the old way, the guards, guns and gates mentality. And you know, so I was talking about, you know, I went to Israel 2008. And brought back a series of drones. I saw drones 2008 going, wow, these are different platform, different drone, you know, drone vehicles, but all operating off one operational platform so you could back that's. That's. 17 years ago, 16 years ago, 15 years ago, I'm doing my maths. I thought we were going to be much more advanced in drones, but we're getting there now. But I just saw it back then, just thinking, wow, the world is going to be so advanced as we move forward. The, there's no shortage of, it's oh, what's the word? Recession proof, the security industry, in fact, it gets better when the world's going bad, security gets better, and so you're never going to be out of a job. And if your particular domain changes, then you just, you can switch over, you can reapply your skills in a new area. And that's another, you know, recommendation for the sector is you'll always need it again. Maslow's theory, it's a fundamental requirement to feel safe and secure. So therefore you will always have a job in the security industry. They're

Yoyo: 24:57

looking at space critical infrastructure. The principles are going to apply the same, aren't they, whether it's land based critical infrastructure, the social engineering threat still applies, your weakest link is the person who still uses the weakest, most stupid password or most guessable password, you know, are those that are working with space critical infrastructure having to think differently? Are they setting trends, Chris? Are we following what they're doing or Doesn't there seem to be a disparity between land and space critical national infrastructure protection?

Chris Cubbage: 25:32

Yeah, there's, there is a space OSAC which is a global group. There's, you know, financial OSACs and the health OSACs that look at security across sectors, but there is a call and we did a session during our security consultant series on space and cyber. And there's a forum even being held for the first time here in Australia on cyber and space. We did one in Adelaide last year. There was a international letter. of concern written by authors around the world saying we're not giving enough attention to cyber security, but it is coming fast. So at our Indo Pacific space and earth conference, we have a session on cyber security. I moderated a session early this year in Singapore at the global space and technology. Conference and I'll be doing it again in February in Singapore. And there's actually, it was last year, this year, it was on cybersecurity was the last session on the last day. So. After that session, it now it's the last session on the first day, because when you have a discussion around the vulnerabilities of systems and people and the critical nature of these systems, everyone gets it. But the other point in space technology, there's a lot of startups. So yes, you got your NASA's and your primes doing this, but there's a lot of startups in space and the space industry, and they don't necessarily have the resources. To do cyber well, right? They're building either satellites or components that go on satellites or they're applying different data platforms and They sometimes don't get it. These are academic researchers or engineers. They need to be taught good cybersecurity principles as well. Yes, they might know the OT side, the performance and safety side, but are they, do they understand the C I A approach as well? And that's the nexus between OT and it. The thinking is d. They think, well, you can't think that, oh, it's a satellite. It's in space. No one's got physical access to it. Well, actually, yes, they do. And they, you know, the Chinese and the Russians will fly their satellites up. Besides, you know, and it's happened, you know, where absolutely. Yeah. And so that's why they make these satellites heavier on jamming because our adversaries will move their satellites to take out block. They're now putting robotic arms on satellites. So, and this technology is coming around in trying to solve the space debris problem, right? We've got to clean up the junk, the space junk that we've put out there but at the same time, that means we're building a a space satellite robot. I interviewed NASA just last week they're building a satellite swarm. Right. This is research project, but they'll have a swarm of satellites, not a constellation, a swarm. So the swarm, you know how a swarm operates, but through a central hub but really amazing technology. So they can maneuver these satellites around and they can attach themselves to other things. And so, yeah, you, when you think, ah, it's a satellite, it's up there and no one can touch it. They can. So.

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Yoyo: 30:04

It's not just a space race in the sense of who can get to the moon first or who can own a bit of Mars first. It's a space race in relation to who's going to own and control the space

Chris Cubbage: 30:15

above us. And the data that comes with it the control of our military systems and our national security all very much rely on space. And then, you know, that, that's where we, you might hear things like sovereign launch capability. Because you might have satellites that you rely on up there and then, you know, the adversary can come and take them all out and suddenly you're blind. Well, you need to have the capability to relaunch and that is literally what the sort of the war gaming is they, yeah, you need to. Get back up. You need to be resilient in space. We are reliant on these so much. And first point of con, it's the first point of attack will be cyber and space. When war breaks out, they will try to shut down all coms and that, and it won't just be a cyber attack. It'll be your communication satellites and any other satellite that your defense systems rely on. And so yeah, that, that's the first point of call.

Yoyo: 31:23

Wow. So you're, so those countries, there will be many of them that don't have capabilities to have space launch programs to go to the moon. So now we're seeing a hegemony exist, aren't we, in relation to space dominance. And those countries with hegemony will obviously be selling the accessibility they provide by GPS to those countries who, Clearly don't have the capability to create that themselves. That's creating, I think, geopolitically quite a huge imbalance, isn't it, between the countries that can and the countries that will always be in debt. Because once you're in debt to using another provider's GPS to have the accessibility for your own nation, you're... You're almost, yeah, because you can't have disagreements with that country. You can't go to war with that country. The balance of power really shifts with this

Chris Cubbage: 32:20

piece, doesn't it? Yeah. And you've got the risk factor there comes up. So the point, again, the point of attack on a cyber, you think about a normal cyber attack you can't attribute that straight away, right? You can be subject to a denial of service attack or ransomware attack. And, you know, the attribution involved in uncovering who was involved in the background is not instantaneous. And the same thing with space, you could have satellites collide with other satellites and you can, how can you attribute what happened? You know, if a Chinese satellite accidentally smashes into an American satellite and takes out a critical piece of communication hardware or whatever what was it an attack or was it an accident? You know, these are the, and these are the conversations that the U. S. and China are having right now. America is raising this, even at the U. N. level, going and at international space conferences, saying the Chinese are not talking to us. We're warning them of potential, you know, trajectory collisions, and they don't answer back. So, if a collision occurs, is that on purpose? Or is it an accident? Negligent? You launch a counter attack based on, if you're not sure, but does that give, and again, this comes into play of, what if there's a major cyber attack that you can't attribute? What if there's an accidental satellite collision that takes out a number of different satellites and causes a it? So what's the next call? You're going to, how can you counter attack a pre attack event or events that are happening in real time, but you can't attribute whether it's the Russians or the Chinese, or whether it's an accident or whether it's a you know, ransomware gang that's suddenly been out of control, have get control of a satellite. So. You know, these are questions that need to be asked and answered. No one can answer them. I ask a lot of people, no one knows. Because

Yoyo: 34:26

there probably isn't a model for it yet because it hasn't happened

Chris Cubbage: 34:29

yet. And or there'll be people who understand the space side of things and go, okay, well, we're tracking, you know, we're tracking a lot of. You know, debris and satellites and yeah, we could probably attribute that pretty quickly. Okay, well then you need to talk to the cyber people because they're simultaneously, there'll be a cyber attack. And then you go, okay, well, are you able to attribute that attack? And then are they going to talk to other space people going to talk to the side of people to understand and put these things together and understand the answer at the end is yes, you've got militarization of space and you've got space force in the US and there are military space domains that they're very much at the forefront of all of this, but from a civil space and security sector, we're going to be the last to know. Right. Yeah. War. Thank you. War will be underway before we even know it, and the timeline, I don't know. Some analysts are saying that we're at pre war phase already so...

Yoyo: 35:29

What other key indicators do you think that they're basing that decision on?

Chris Cubbage: 35:34

I don't know, the fact that we're at war in Europe the fact that the Chinese are flying over Taiwanese airspace daily, the fact that the South China City is completely militarized by the U. S. and China and they're butting heads now the fact that North Korea are firing off intercontinental ballistic missiles over Japan whenever they want you know, Pretty much, that's what I would base my thinking on is, I think that's good. Yeah, just be alive and be alive to the military exercises that have been run particularly in our region. I don't know if you see it in the UK. You probably hear a lot around Russia and Ukraine and war in Eastern Europe. But here in South, in Oceania and Asia Pacific, or we call it Indo Pacific, you think... You know, again we launched the Asia Pacific security magazine when Australia came out with a Asia Pacific white paper. And based on the escalation, they changed the language and announced called the Indo Pacific to take Asia out. All right. Yeah. Recognize China. So the language changed 10 years ago. China's building up its military with a force to be Equivalent to the U. S. By 2035. And I talked to, you know, our senior analysts in this domain to in terms of geopolitics, because as you say, you have to understand the geopolitics at play to understand where the technology is going to head. That's why we've now got a binary technology sector. You've got Chinese tech, and then you've got Western tech and the nor do the two come together. You don't have. Huawei 5G in the UK, like we don't have Huawei 5G in in in Australia. And a range of other hardware, video security cameras, right? Huawei and uh, Hikvision cameras. You don't, you can't use them anymore. So this binary approach into trade comes again from a military and geopolitical anxiety that they both have. And it is now over Taiwan and don't get me started on the geopolitics of all of this because we'll get ourselves into trouble, but, you know, Russia invaded Ukraine and whether that was warranted or not, you know, I see it from an analyst viewpoint of, I get it. I see both sides, the US and NATO were right on their border. And did they have any choice, you know, and then you've got the same thing happening. I've got a comment from an interview I did on on this, on YouTube. And I talk about, you know, the Chinese militarization of the South China sea. And quite rightly, the person said, well, hang on. The U. S. has got bases all around China in the South China Sea and they were there well before China. So it's only China responding to the dominance of American and presence, but yet dominance as well of America. And so, you know, who who's starting this fight? I don't know. I don't care. I wish we were at peace with China. I wish it wasn't like that. And, but you know, it's a shame on both sides.

Yoyo: 38:56

I had a very interesting chat with a South African over a bourbon once and and it was good because I realized, and I don't want to come across naive, but I think we're all a bit naive in this sense that history is told in different ways, isn't it? around the world. And then when I was having some British history relayed back to me, and I didn't even get told that in school, and it, and the history isn't, I tend to look forward rather than back. So history is a subject that I'm hugely passionate about, but to hear British history through a non native British person is, I think, something all British people should do. And again, you know, we're given this kind of hilt. On, on the history that I think benefits the most and I think other countries do it the same as well. I wouldn't say that we're unique in that. I think every country talks about its history in a different way. And I think that's a shame because it does feel like there's a huge mass manipulation. And it's like anything, you know, you pick any incident and you pick five people who were there, they're all going to have a different version or interpretation. So how can we ever really have the facts? You know, we can be very open, I think, in our history telling and say, look, you know, there are other people who think it happened a different way and let's provoke. Thought and critical thinking in young children, you know, you imagine yourself there. What do you think could have been happening? And I think there's a lot of things we're getting wrong. And, you know, the more I do these podcasts, the more I realize, crikey, you know, we're very lucky, I think, on earth to be alive at all, you know, with the amount of fingers nearly on red buttons over the last 20 years.

Chris Cubbage: 40:39

But I think it's always been like that. And you're right. You know, these sort of controlling powers come and go, you know, the Spanish have had to go, the French have had to go, the British have had to go. I think when America was at its height, everyone sort of took a deep breath and thought, Okay, well, this is how it'll be forever, right? America will always be the most powerful and it will never be superseded. But I think that's clearly, they're almost broke. Like literally, just the other day, they just had to expand by 45 days. Otherwise they would have had a shutdown. So, and how many, this just comes around again and again, and then they expand and they're going broke. And if you look at, you know, past superpowers, this is exactly how it happens. So the future will be unknown how, you know, the rise of China, the rise of India. The outcome of what happens between Russia and Ukraine still issues in the Middle East, this will probably just be ongoing, you know, it's just humanity sort of just going around in circles and history will definitely repeat itself. I do think we will end up. You know, in a major military conflict and sometimes conflict is good, right? You have a conflict is a resolution to issues. And then you go into a period of peace again. But we just want to be on the winning side as often as we possibly can. Cause you know, again, world war two is not that long ago and look at the atrocities of that, right? Just look at what actually happened. How in my. You know, Vietnam War in my lifetime 20 years of war in Afghanistan Iraq. The war machine of the U. S., of China, of Europe, NATO, you know, we have to be at war. We've built this thing and it has to be, we have to, can you imagine if everyone put their swords down? What? What would we do with ourselves?

Yoyo: 42:34

Well, I remember this cartoon from a newspaper that I used to deliver newspapers as a kid. I was about 14 years old. So I literally have had a job ever since then. And I saw this two aliens and they're looking out their spaceship window at earth. And there's these kind of bubbles of speech above their heads. And one says, should we go and say hello? And the other one says no. They're not ready for us because they're still pointing guns at each other. I just thought, how true is that? It always stuck in my

Chris Cubbage: 43:04

head. I always thought space was a good way to bring nations together and we had, you know, Russian cosmonauts on the international space and, you know, had Americans and Russians, you know, forming lifelong friendships and it's possible. And space is proven as possible, however, unfortunately now, you know, the International Space Center station is coming to an end and the Chinese are building a new one, and no doubt the Americans will not be allowed on there, and we are going into a binary space program. And more multiple, you know, you mentioned different countries will have this power and that's probably what you know, I'll refer to Professor Hugh White, who talks about this. This is how it used to be. So we are going back in that full circle where we will have different regional powers. Both in conflict, but also in collaboration, and it's probably a better, safer way to be, pre World War II, in a way and yeah, so you don't have one dominant power, we don't want two dominant powers, but if we can get four or five, dominant powers, then they can start to control each other a little bit better, at least for a period. It's going to be a lot of work, and it's a new era for humanity as we move into this century, you know,

Yoyo: 44:29

Or at least they could, or at least they could take some goddamn responsibility for the sustainability of our humankind. Do you know what I mean? Together.

Chris Cubbage: 44:36

I only look at who's in charge sometimes and I just shake my

Yoyo: 44:40

head. That's another conversation. Hey listen,, I've got to ask you about sustainability. Because, as a human race, we seem to be choosing when to use sustainability and when it's relevant. And I don't think it's, when you look at the space junk and the amount of rubbish in our atmosphere up there, as you've alluded to, and I saw your podcast from, well, I saw your YouTube channel on, and when you interviewed that lovely lady, who's a space archeologist, which is phenomenal. Oh, Alice

Chris Cubbage: 45:12

Gorman, yeah.

Yoyo: 45:13

Yeah, she's phenomenal. I thought, crikey, space archaeology, that's a new one, and it's awesome and very relevant, but we can't just decide, can we, what's sustainable on one hand, and on the other hand, be wrecking ourselves. What's the plan there to make our space free of rubbish?

Chris Cubbage: 45:31

We're trying. Again, I can't help but be a skeptic and a pessimist, but there are legitimate, genuine people out there that are genuinely trying and they're lovely people. And. You know, I wish them all well and that someone's got to be doing it. Someone's at least got to try, but it's really hard when you say, look, here's a set of rules. And the UN did create a set of rules and then the likes of Russia, China, and, but the trouble with that is they're our rules, right? We create our rules. Okay, everybody. Here's a set of rules. We all have to follow this. And obviously these rules lean our way slightly. And you know, we've already ruined the planet. We've already made all this junk. So can we all just follow these new rules? And by, you know, By the way, maybe Russia, China, North Korea don't want to follow the, our rules. And, but we've put them out there as if, you know, here's some rules to break so we can judge you if you do the wrong thing. And then you got Russia landing into the, you know, crashing into the moon and the like. We've had space junk just recently flying over Melbourne, but we've had Indian space junk landing on the beaches of Western Australia. So, and we didn't know what it was, we had to find out where that came from. So. You know, it's good to have rules and people creating rules. We're working with the Secure World Foundation in Washington, I think or New York. And we're media partners to their conference in New York this year. And, you know, again, I've done a number of interviews with them on space sustainability and they're doing very important work. But not everyone follows the rules. So it's a bit like, you know, and there's no cop on the beat either. So you can have the best road rules in the world, but then you've still got idiots driving around creating havoc for everybody. Yeah. But it's not in their interest to follow the rules either. No.

Yoyo: 47:30

So. Because it costs them money and. Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Cubbage: 47:34

But it also, you know, when you talk about sustainability, again, I see the counter argument of, hang on, the Western world has created all of this pollution and created and made money out of it. And then put rules on developing nations to say you can't do it our way, you have to follow the way we say now. And this is how you have to do it and to do it properly, I need our technology to do it. So you have to buy from us. And so I get it, but I'm quite the pessimist on how it all operates. And I don't have a lot of hope for the long term future, if anything, and we've used this numbered times buckle up for the next 10 years, because the next 10 years is. Game time, right? How the world, how we move into the 2040s, no one would know. We do have a plan for 2030s. And you, and that's written by the likes of China and their military plans and national defense plans for the next 10 years. You know, that's the road we're on, have a mindset that we're in a pre war phase. So you're going to need to be resilient. You're going to need to make sure your people are resilient from a national perspective. You're going to need to make sure your population is resilient, educated and smart. They're going to need to know what is fake and what is real. And not just what they hear, but what they see. This is really a critical time in our history. It's why you talk about that tagline I have of investigating the crossroads of humanity and technology. We are it right now. We've got amazing robotics. We've got humanoid robotics. We've got, in fact, tomorrow I fly to Malaysia. And hopefully on Thursday, I'll be interviewing Grace the robot, who's giving a keynote speech. Cool. So this is a humanoid female robot driven by AI, and that's the future right there. So I don't know what I, what should I ask her, Yo?

Yoyo: 49:45

Ask her if she likes humans.

Chris Cubbage: 49:49

I think someone has already asked that and she said, no, I think she said, no, I think there was a conference where, you know, it was something around that and they had, they are, yeah, and we could, yeah, it was something like that. So look. I can, you know, I know we've spoken for about an hour and I could, that's a whole new domain, but really, yeah, it's that's where we're at. I think it's a fascinating time to be alive, but it's also challenging, and I'm not saying we haven't had this in the past. Obviously every generation, every decade has its own unique challenges. But, you know, we. Really are at a crossroads between the geopolitics at play, the technology at play human you know, climate change and human existence and how we exist is changing before our very eyes and faster than what we'd ever thought of before. So just buckle up and hang on and enjoy the ride. And if you're in the space sector or the security sector, you're recession proof. You'll have a job.

Yoyo: 50:59

You gave a really good prophecy of the 2040s and it made me wonder what a tough time Gen X could have in their retirement. You know, Gen X worked really hard. We're a generation known for working really hard and we'll get to this beautiful retirement. I just don't think it's going to be that easy. I still have the idea that. Things are going to be very disrupted indeed and I would love more than ever to listen to this in 10 years time and think oh that man was talking a load of fluff, but I've got an awful worry that you're actually talking an awful lot of sense and that's the worrying thing.

Chris Cubbage: 51:31

It's about things but only if you've got money. As long as you've got money. You'd be fine, because that's the, you know, maybe gold is what you should be investing in. Because I think, you know, the technology will make our lives better. it absolutely will make humans better and smarter. You know, the likes of Elon Musk and his computer brain interface kind of context. We're going to solve a lot of those things. You know, the robotics in healthcare for elderly will be really interesting. So there's a lot of good things. But again, the knife always cuts both ways and whatever we can excel ourselves at, we can just as well destroy ourselves on the other end. And unfortunately, there's always someone out there who wants to ruin the party. And it might be a nation state, it might be a ransomware gang or an organized crime gang, or it might just be a psychopath. And so unfortunately, you know, the gated. Communities and dystopian future is absolutely I bet my house on you're going to be that's where we'll end up with, and then it'll probably be our cities will make safe, but anything outside of that, because we're going to need to adapt to climate. And we're going to need to build probably new cities as well, because some cities. You know, what's the European city sinking?

Yoyo: 52:56

Oh, you're talking about yes,

Chris Cubbage: 52:58

it is, but they reckon by the end of the century, that's going to be underwater. So they have to move it. They're moving. They're

Yoyo: 53:05

raising, yeah, they're raising houses in Venice all the time. They're raising them. They're on stilts.

Chris Cubbage: 53:12

They're talking about relocating and they're going to need to rebuild Jakarta. They're going to literally move Jakarta. That's a big city because it's sinking. So, in fact,

Yoyo: 53:22

Jakarta is one of the most populated cities in the world. Yeah. Wow. That's a big

Chris Cubbage: 53:28

displacement. Yeah, absolutely. And our population will change as well by the end of the century, because again, think again, I, I'm 52 which. Sounds young, but 50 years put think in 2073, what the world will be like. And I was driving in a Tesla with a young girl who was, I think she was five or six years with a friend's daughter and the Tesla, the new Teslas seeing people in recognizing cars, bikes around it. And I said to the poor Uber driver, I said, mate, you're going to, by the time she's growing up in our age, you're out of the job. The car is driving itself.

Yoyo: 54:06

Yeah. Thanks. And it's going to be called Johnny Cab. Johnny Cab,

Chris Cubbage: 54:10

the total recall. But that's, that is a reality. That will happen sooner rather than later. Well, it's happening

Yoyo: 54:20

now. They're delivering pizzas with automated cars. In the States. Yeah, driverless cars. So, the

Chris Cubbage: 54:25

goal would think 50 years. Oh, yeah. And that's what I try to do. And then if you can't think in certain ways like that, then yeah you just start to look for it. And you'll start to see it really coming through and we will adapt. We may well have wiped out most of the world's population by then at some point, but you know, climate change will do it for us. Yeah. We will find a way. And we will evolve and continue and humanity, I'm not saying it's the end of humanity, but it's definitely the end of how we live today and how we've been living for the last 50 years is definitely going to be changing and it's going to happen really quick.

Yoyo: 55:04

Because the analogue humans will end up leaving us this is the next generation that will depart. We become

Chris Cubbage: 55:09

digital. You are absolutely right. I've followed it through my career. The waves of technology advances from analogue to digital. Yep. Digital to analytics. Analytics to AI. Yeah. AI into... Embedded computer brain interfaces with ourselves to increase our own intelligence and add that cognitive human cognitive intelligence to an AI, and then you will have the point of singularity where an AI will be a hybrid human. And that's. That will be our future with robotic skeleton sort of form. You know, we all carry around a mobile phone now with cyborgs as it is. We won't need devices and will be a constant wearable connected to an intercon international network. And that is a foreseeable. a lifetime still, probably within 30 to 40 years, that is possible.

Yoyo: 56:07

Will we become moaning Gen Xers then, just moaning about how we're so awesome?

Chris Cubbage: 56:13

Yeah, that's also another foreseeable outcome for sure. Oh

Yoyo: 56:17

dear, we're going to leave this planet to an exciting, optimistic, love, people loving generation of people who are going to look after it for us. Surely if we make enough mistakes, they will realize it needs looking after. God, but anyway, listen Don't listen to this podcast before bedtime, kids.

Chris Cubbage: 56:37

I get it a lot. Yeah. I get it a lot when I talk at a conference that everyone is always deadly silence after I finished. Everyone's like, oh shit. So, but unfortunately I call it how I see it. But I do come in with a bias. I think the policing mindset changes you and makes you a bit of a skeptic, negative. Kind of person and I accept that part. So always take it with a grain of salt and try to see the good part of people. And maybe the Pareto principle counts. So 80 percent are good and 20 percent are bad and work around that. So yeah, majority are good.

Yoyo: 57:16

Yeah. That's it. We don't teach you nothing here at the security circle podcast. Chris Cubbage, thank you so, so much for your time today.

Chris Cubbage: 57:24

Wonderful. Absolute pleasure. Yo enjoy the rest of your day.