CATAPAN Swift Key Technology

Rapid Response is Everything

While it is vital our digital platforms and networks ensure our sensitive information remains secure through resilient encryption methods, this can often come at the expense of our ability to adapt and respond swiftly to new and emerging threats.

Although the defense industry is gradually moving towards a more digital approach in its operations, the way in which we distribute our key material remains incredibly manual. Creation, delivery, storage and management of physical materials is a huge burden in today's digital world.

The time, money and risk taken to produce, deliver and install physical key material makes it difficult and extremely costly to remain agile when faced with emerging threats.

Multiply that across the thousands of deployed devices requiring re-keying on an annual basis for the UK alone and it is clear things need to change.

In today's fast-paced digital world - rapid response is everything.

Why L3Harris, and why CATAPAN?

01

We've been providing government-grade information assurance and resilience solutions for over 20 years

02

We're proud to have built long-standing relationships with UK government and commercial agencies

03

We've delivered endorsed, accredited technology and award-winning products (Queen's Award for Mini-CATAPAN)

04

Not only have we developed robust hardware solutions, we also offer through-life support for deployed devices

Swift Key Technology

Swift by name. Secure by nature.

For decades L3Harris has provided government-grade encryption to our customers and partners through our robust and reliable CATAPAN solutions and services. Built upon the same renowned principles, CATAPAN Swift Key Technology is a new capability that modernizes key delivery and management across the wider mission.

CATAPAN Swift Key Technology keeps pace with emerging threats while improving operational agility and resilience. Using symmetric key transfer standards to enable over-the-network keying (OTNK) and enhanced key management, CATAPAN Swift Key Technology eliminates the need for incumbent sensitive hardware - reducing operational risk, reducing costs, and vastly improving mission agility.

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From key creation through to delivery and management, risks such as loss, theft and compromise of sensitive information, or even risk to life, are far from ideal when operational resilience is at stake. With CATAPAN Swift Key Technology, physical key material is eliminated, and as a result so is much of that risk.
Key life-cycle:	Physical key material risk:	Swift key technology risk:
Creation	Risk of insider threat Risk of security breach Risk of loss or theft	No physical material - risk eliminated
Delivery and transit	Risk of interception in transit Risk of loss or theft Risk to life if transiting austere zones	No physical transit - risk eliminated
Key management	Secure physical storage required Risk of physical loss or theft	No physical material - risk eliminated
Key disposal	Risk of interception in transit Risk of loss or theft Risk to life if transiting austere zones	No physical transit - risk eliminated

Physical key material encompasses many noticable burdens. From finding secure physical storage space and manual labor, to cumbersome logistics and the time taken to carry them out. CATAPAN Swift Key Technology eradicates these burdens since key material is delivered over-the-network at scale and at pace.
Key life-cycle:	Physical key material burden:	Swift key technology burden:
Creation	Storage of discs, drives Manual labor	No physical material = no burden
Delivery	Must be couriered by personnel May travel thousands of miles Journey may take days Must deliver key to every unit	Delivered over-the-network at scale and at pace
Annual re-key	Key delivery to every unit, every year Re-keying an entire fleet takes weeks	Delivered over-the-network at scale and at pace
Disposal	Expired physical key material must be physically destroyed at the end of the year	No physical material to destroy

Physical key material is costly. It must be physically delivered by specialized personnel. The cost of logistics in terms of delivering that material on an annual basis to every keyed device, is huge. CATAPAN Swift Key Technology eliminates that cost through over-the-network keying.
Key life-cycle:	Physical key material cost:	Swift key technology:
Creation	Specialized personnel salary Physical material costs: CDs, drives	Key generated automatically Key is non-physical - no materials
Delivery	Specialized courier salary Taxis, flights; all return Hotels/accommodation if required	OTNK= No courier required OTNK= No transport required OTNK= No accommodation required
Annual re-key	As above	OTNK= re-keying at scale and at pace
Disposal	Expired physical key material must be physically returned and destroyed involving the same effort and cost as delivery	Cost is eliminated as there is no physical material to return or destroy

Future technologies must strive to offer integration across the fleet. CATAPAN Swift Key Technology can be networked with other CATAPAN solutions enabling seamless integration.

Though this can technically happen with physically keyed devices, the ability to change or alter those networks once they are in place has huge physical impacts due to the requirement to re-key every device again. Network changes would require a considerable amount of planning well in advance costing time and money to action.

Since CATAPAN Swift Key Technology enables seamless integration across the fleet, keys are generated and distributed at scale and at pace, making network changes simple to facilitate.

Physical key material:

Swift key technology:

L3Harris CATAPAN Swift Key Seamless Integration with Physical Keys

In a world where being one step ahead of the threat is everything, CATAPAN Swift Key Technology enables vastly improved mission agility. Ensuring that sensitive information is locked away from those who may use it against us is critical to mission success. Should that data be at risk of compromise, re-keying devices via current methods is not agile and could take many weeks, during which users have to find a work-around.

CATAPAN Swift Key Technology can re-key devices across the fleet with ease ensuring swift action is taken.

Physical key material:

Swift key technology:

"Requesting assistance. Data has been compromised."

L3Harris CATAPAN Swift Key Increased Agility with Physical Keys

Physical key material will take weeks to create and distribute.

"Requesting assistance. Data has been compromised."

L3Harris CATAPAN Swift Key Increased Agility with Swift Key Technology

Secure digital key is generated swiftly and securely distributed over-the-network.

Swift Key Technology in Action

By digitizing the nature of key material distribution, CATAPAN Swift Key Technology enables re-keying at a vastly improved scale and pace. From keying to annual re-keying, multiple devices can be deployed to in one swift action. Importantly, CATAPAN Swift Key Technology gives organizations the freedom to reinvest the time, money and personnel resources once used to distribute and manage physical materials into the tasks and operations that matter most.

Digitizing the Battlespace

"Digital is fundamental to how defense needs to respond to the disruptive world. Digital will be at the heart of the wider transformation of defense."
- Charles Forte, Ministry of Defense

Whether in times of conflict or in times of peace, any process to protect sensitive data must have confidentiality and integrity at its core. In today's fast-paced digital world, however, we must also consider keeping pace with not just the adversary, but the world in general.

CATAPAN Swift Key Technology is forward-thinking in its approach, enabling multi-domain integration via a secure digital backbone - a priority focus in helping to modernize the UK Armed Forces within the Government’s Integrated Review.

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CATAPAN Swift Key Technology