Towards policy-based information management for the Joint Battlespace Infosphere

The vision of a Joint Battlespace Infosphere has evolved within the US department of defense as an Internet-like foundation to provide tailored information services and flow among producers and consumers of information needed to conduct military operations. The architecture envisioned for realizing this vision is based on a loosely coupled information environment using commercial standard Web protocols. One of the main obstacles to widespread acceptance of loosely coupled systems is the difficulty of establishing and maintaining control consistent with overall mission constraints and objectives. Policy-based information dissemination management is a mechanism for influencing the flow of information between publishers and subscribers in order to support diverse mission objectives. We describe research being done on the selection and integration of policy-based management services, effectively bridging the gap between those services and the information brokering capabilities of a JBI platform.