Defeating Cognitive Sensors

Future cognitive radars will be threatened by jammers which employ cognitive capabilities to disrupt sensor capability. As cognitive capabilities are developed and deployed in packages of decreasing SWAP, script-based electronic protection systems relying heavily on a-priori information will be increasingly vulnerable. Cognitive electronic protection represents a capability that can restore the function of radar systems when faced with cognitive jammer threats. Vadum will develop the Electronic Warfare Advanced Capability Estimation (EW-ACE) suite of algorithms to provide electronic protection against cognitive jammer systems. The EW-ACE algorithms on Pulse Descriptor Words (PDWs) or similar high-level descriptions of received emissions and consist of association, characterization and inference algorithms. These algorithms are connected by a Jammer Behavior Object (JBO) which serves as a hierarchical data structure for storing information about both jammer observations (i.e., incoming PDWs) and inferences made during the execution of the algorithm. The JBO is a persistent data structure capturing a description of jammer behavior sufficient for EW-ACE to suggest electronic protection measures. After the execution of electronic protection measures, EW-ACE will monitor the response of the jammer and assess the effectiveness of the measures. The results of the assessment will be captured within the JBO for post-mission analysis.