Japan’s Cybersecurity
By Federica Cidale
Background on East Asian Security Situation
In recent years, Japan has been increasing the amount of GDP spending on military-related matters. In December 2022, Japanese Prime Minister (PM) Kishida unveiled a 114.4 trillion-yen budget, which featured increased military and welfare spending. Kishida’s plan is to increase Japan’s defense spending to 2% of its GDP by 2027. For instance, the defense spending has already risen from 1.4 trillion yen in 2022 to 6.8 trillion yen in 2023 (Kajimoto & Yamaguchi, 2022). For a nation like Japan, which has fervently upheld pacifism since the conclusion of World War Two, this is a significant move.
This transformation seems to be caused by the rising tensions in the East Asian region. Japan is in fact surrounded by non-friendly countries: China is increasingly more assertive and North Korea is boosting its nuclear capabilities. In 2022, North Korea launched over 95 missiles, some of which also flew across Japan's airspace (Sang-Hun, 2023). Adding to the already complicated East Asian security situation is now Russia. Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, many past and present diplomatic issues have emerged. In June 2022, Russia suspended an agreement that allowed Japanese fishermen to fish near the disputed Southern Kuril Islands. The suspension came just after Japanese and NATO officials agreed to step up military cooperation (Al Jazeera and News Agencies, 2022). Moreover, Russia has deployed mobile coastal defense missile systems on a Kuril Island with a range of up to 500 km (Reuters, 2022). Against this backdrop, the motivation behind Japan's efforts to update its military budget and amend Article 9 is clear.
Japan’s Cybersecurity vis-à-vis Russia & China
Due to the close connection between the military and cybersecurity, a rise in military investment will also result in an increase in cybersecurity. The Japanese government began developing defenses against prospective cyberattacks in the 1990s (Bartlett, 2020). Nevertheless, Japan was not too serious about cyber security until a series of cyber incidents ended up revealing the country’s cyber security vulnerabilities (Kallender & Hughes, 2017). China, North Korea and Russia (Japan’s closest neighbors) have all developed offensive capabilities in the cyber domain. It is no surprise that most cyber-attacks against Japan originated either from China or North Korea (Bartlett, 2020).
Russia, in particular, despite not having yet targeted Japan, is famous for its cyber warfare, like the interference in 2016 US election (Ackerman et al., 2017; Sauer, 2022) and, recently, leaking documents “Vulkan” demonstrated how Russia has been developing tools for cyberattacks and techniques to disseminate online misinformation (Harding et al., 2023). China, too, is skilled in cyberwarfare, notably cognitive warfare. Cognitive warfare aims at manipulating people’s emotions and perceptions to influence public opinion by using cyber tools. China mentioned cyberspace several times in its “China’s National Defence in the New Era” (State Council Information Office of the People’s Republic of China, 2019). The document defined cyberspace as “a key area for national security, economic growth and social development” and stated that the country must accelerate the armed forces’ cyberspace capabilities. Furthermore, China declared the cognitive sphere to be the seventh military domain, together with land, sea, air, space, electromagnetic and cyberspace (Nishikawa, 2023).
The neighbors’ building up of cyber capabilities eventually prompted Japan to boost its own cybersecurity capabilities, too. Previously, Japan’s cyber deterrence strategy was severely lacking as its security policy strictly focused on military aspects, leaving cyberspace out of the equation. There was indeed no mention of cyberspace in Japan’s annual Defence White Papers until 2010 (Katagiri, 2021). The situation changed from 2014 onwards as Japan has been steadily investing in its cybersecurity infrastructure, with a budget increase from 26.70 billion yen in 2004 to 71.29 billion yen in 2019 (Bartlett, 2020). Japan became more aware of the growing threats posed by cyberattacks for two key reasons: 1) Japan Self Defence Forces (JSDF) heavily rely on advanced technology for their operations and 2) Japan’s plan to digitize government practices and bureaucracy (Bartlett, 2020; デジタル庁, 2023). This growing reliance on cyber technologies could make the country more susceptible to cyberattacks. To note is that Japan cyber capabilities are still defensive in nature due to the article 9 of Japan’s constitution, which outlaws war and the use of force as a political instrument (Bartlett, 2020).
Changes in Cybersecurity
Due to the aforementioned threats, Japan has decided to revise its National Security Strategy by including the cyber dimension to it. The primary goal of this essay is to study the most recent developments following the Russian invasion of Ukraine because this occurrence has significantly influenced Japan's choice to increase its focus on cybersecurity. It is beyond the scope of this article to analyze Japan's security’s changes every year.
The ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s proposal (自由民主党政務調査会, 2022) to revise the National Security Strategy, released in April 2022, emphasized the threat posed by Russia and identified a new kind of warfare that includes both military occupation and cyber warfare. It is written that, as shown by the events following the invasion of Ukraine, Russia did not just attack cities with missiles but prior to the invasion, it manipulated mainstream media and social media to spread misinformation. It also attacked critical infrastructure like nuclear power plants. The proposal emphasized that the war we all feared became reality all at once (自由民主党政務調査会, 2022, p. 01). Moreover, the proposal contained an entire section dedicated to “changes in the way of fighting” (戦い方の変化) that included advanced technology (AI, drone, quantum technology), hybrid warfare, information warfare, and cyber-related matters (自由民主党政務調査会, 2022, p. 05).
Following the proposal, in December 2022, Japan released three strategic documents: the National Security Strategy (NSS), National Defence Strategy (NDS) and Defence Build-up Program (DBP). They outline Japan’s security challenges and how the country will address them (Osawa, 2023). The NSS, Japan's top national security policy document, will establish the nation's security for the next 10 years (Osawa, 2023). The NSS mentions the term “cyber” numerous times with an entire section on “improving response capabilities in the field of cybersecurity”. The document presents cybersecurity as a critical part of Japan’s defence that “should be strengthened equal to or surpassing the level of leading Western countries” (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, 2022c, p. 23). Japan, in this strategy, does not only mention cyberattacks targeting physical infrastructure but also the spread of misinformation: “[...] bolstering the ability to respond to information warfare in the cognitive domain” (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, 2022c, p. 27). It outlines the creation of a new entity that will be able to counter information warfare by gathering and analyzing disinformation, the strengthening of external communications and enhancement of cooperation with non-governmental agencies (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, 2022c).
The NDS defines JSDF’s defense strategy in the next 10 years. It also often mentions cyberspace and cybersecurity. The document lays out Japan’s plan to enhance its intelligence capabilities to counter hybrid and integrated information warfare by 2027 (Nishikawa, 2023): “in line with the government’s overall cybersecurity policy which will be comprehensively coordinated in a centralized manner, MOD/SDF [Ministry of Defense/Self Defense Forces] will enhance its cybersecurity capability” (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, 2022b, p. 16). The DBP goes in more details about the intelligence capabilities: it outlines the creation of a new system within the Defence Intelligence Headquarter to enhance JSDF’ response to information warfare (Nishikawa, 2023) and the establishment of a Cyber School to better train personnel for cybersecurity purposes (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, 2022a; Osawa, 2023). All the 3 documents emphasized the importance of collaborating with like-minded partners such as the US, the UK, Australia and ASEAN to enhance cybersecurity.
Conclusion
Following the release of these documents, we can already see developments in the field. Japan plans to start using an artificial intelligence-based system to analyze foreign disinformation campaigns in order to counter fake news on social media platforms (Asahina, 2023). This is in line with what was said in the NSS that Japan will build more on countering disinformation online. In an interview, JSDF Major General Tanaka Tatsuhiro emphasized the need to establish a “cyber minister” in order to build a more integrated cyber defense system. He highlights the importance of cybersecurity in this digitalized world. As reliance on the internet is increasing in every field from business to state, General Tatsuhiro stated that “we need to have strong cybersecurity infrastructure” (Takahashi, 2022). The recent changes in National Security, the efforts to digitize society and the possible creation of a cyber minister all point to the fact that Japan is increasingly anxious about the use of cyber technologies for malicious purposes.
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