Department of National Defence allocates considerable funding to a UCalgary joint project
By Luis Armando Sanchez Diaz, July 15 2021—
Recently, it was announced that the Department of National Defence had allocated considerable funding towards a project led by two well-regarded entities of the University of Calgary.
As reported by UCalgary News the project “will examine the impact of the domestic and international information environments on Canadian national defence and security.”
The University of Calgary’s School of Public Policy and the Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies (CMSS) along with the Canadian Network on Information and Security (CANIS) will run the project for the next three years with the focus on “four nodes: political/military, cognitive/behavioural, technological and legal/ethical.”
Dr. Jean-Christophe Boucher and Dr. Erin Gibbs Van Brunschot from the School of Public Policy and CMSS respectively will oversee the project. Individually, each of the four focuses will have a research team.
Boucher told UCalgary News that the project “endeavours to address security challenges within the information environment and will contribute to practical applications to counter nefarious use of information by a range of actors,” and will also “identify opportunities to better address the domestic defence/security information space.”
Currently, UCalgary Careers has two open vacancies for “Postdoctoral Scholars in the areas of information and security,” to be part of the CANIS project and who “will be expected to contribute to CANIS’ goals and advancing their own research.”
The applicants are expected “to be working in the area of information and security…[and] will have recently completed a Ph.D.,” in one of several noted areas such as political science, law, public policy or computer science among others.
The posting also offers some insight into what the project will focus on.
“[The] primary objective of CANIS is to draw novel conclusions about the information environments and its use as an operational domain. The greater reach and influence of digitization of our society and the potential for information activities and threats by various entities at home and abroad highlight a national defence and security vulnerability.”
Furthermore, “Postdocs will be provided with significant time to work on their own related, independent research projects, and will have access to the co-directors and node leads for advice and guidance,” reads the job offer. The monetary compensation stands at $50,000 a year plus benefits.
Applications are expected to be sent by July 30, 2021. To check all the details and requirements of the job offer click here.