Articles
Autonomous Comms in the Battlespace: AI‑Driven Tactical Networking
Marketing and Outreach Team
14 Oct 2025
10 Min Read
How AI plans, routes, and heals tactical networks under jamming and deception — from UAV relays to multi‑agent swarms — and which standards and security controls matter.
Autonomous Comms in the Battlespace: AI‑Driven Tactical Networking
Jamming, deception, and mobility break rigid communications plans. Research showcased via arXiv, plus operational lessons reported by Janes and Defense News, supports a shift toward AI‑assisted tactical networking.
Edge learning & control. Radios can sense spectrum, estimate link quality, and learn routes using reinforcement learning. To operate on size/weight/power constrained platforms, models are quantised and pruned. Standards from 3GPP (including NTN) and IETF help ensure interoperability.
Adversarial threats. Attackers may inject fake nodes, perform RF fingerprint spoofing, or jam control channels. Mitigations include signed control frames, proof‑of‑possession tokens (mTLS token binding), and anomaly detection. Defence‑in‑depth guidance from NCSC and NATO remains essential.
Latency & compute. Edge inference and cached policies reduce backhaul load; federated learning updates models when connectivity returns. Certification should include SBOM publication and secure cloud deployment patterns.
Mission use‑cases. UAV relay corridors, pop‑up mesh for expeditionary units, maritime task groups, and integrated air defence links. Success equals survivable links, predictable QoS, and graceful degradation.
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Marketing and Outreach Team
AIC’s Marketing and Outreach Team builds visibility and trust across Defence and security. We deliver strategic campaigns, thought leadership, and stakeholder engagement while balancing transparency with discretion. Our mission is to position AIC as a trusted, innovative partner to the UK MoD and beyond.
