Dual-use

In politics, diplomacy and export control, dual-use items refers to goods, software and technology that can be used for both civilian and military applications.''Exporting dual-use goods.''
European Commission (accessed Aug 2022)

More generally speaking, dual-use can also refer to any goods or technology which can satisfy more than one goal at any given time. Thus, expensive technologies that would otherwise benefit only civilian commercial interests can also be used to serve military purposes if they are not otherwise engaged, such as the Global Positioning System.

The "dual-use dilemma" was first noted with the discovery of the process for synthesizing and mass producing ammonia which revolutionized agriculture with modern fertilizers but also led to the creation of chemical weapons during World War I. The dilemma has long been known in chemistry and physics, and has led to international conventions and treaties, including the Chemical Weapons Convention and the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.

Missile

Originally developed as weapons during the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union spent billions of dollars developing rocket technology which could carry humans into space (and even eventually to the moon). The development of this peaceful rocket technology paralleled the development of intercontinental ballistic missile technology; and was a way of demonstrating to the other side the potential of one's own rockets.

Those who seek to develop ballistic missiles may claim that their rockets are for peaceful purposes; for example, for commercial satellite launching or scientific purposes. However, even genuinely peaceful rockets may be converted into weapons and provide the technological basis to do so.

Within peaceful rocket programs, different peaceful applications can be seen as having parallel military roles. For example, the return of scientific payloads safely to earth from orbit would indicate re-entry vehicle capability and demonstrating the ability to launch multiple satellites with a single launch vehicle can be seen in a military context as having the potential to deploy multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles.

Nuclear

Dual-use nuclear technology refers to the possibility of military use of civilian nuclear power technology. Many technologies and materials associated with the creation of a nuclear power program have a dual-use capability, in that several stages of the nuclear fuel cycle allow diversion of nuclear materials for nuclear weapons. When this happens a nuclear power program can become a route leading to the atomic bomb or a public annex to a secret bomb program. The crisis over Iran’s nuclear activities is a case in point.

Many UN and US agencies warn that building more nuclear reactors unavoidably increases nuclear proliferation risks. A fundamental goal for American and global security is to minimize the proliferation risks associated with the expansion of nuclear power. If this development is "poorly managed or efforts to contain risks are unsuccessful, the nuclear future will be dangerous". For nuclear power programs to be developed and managed safely and securely, it is important that countries have domestic “good governance” characteristics that will encourage proper nuclear operations and management:

These characteristics include low degrees of corruption (to avoid officials selling materials and technology for their own personal gain as occurred with the A.Q. Khan smuggling network in Pakistan), high degrees of political stability (defined by the World Bank as “likelihood that the government will be destabilized or overthrown by unconstitutional or violent means, including motivated violence and terrorism”), high governmental effectiveness scores (a World Bank aggregate measure of “the quality of the civil service and the degree of its independence from political pressures ndthe quality of policy formulation and implementation”), and a strong degree of regulatory competence.

Artificial intelligence

As more advancements are made towards artificial intelligence (AI), it garners more and more attention on its capability as a dual-use technology and the security risks it may pose. Artificial intelligence can be applied within many different fields and can be easily integrated throughout current technology's cyberspace. With the use of AI, technology has become capable of running multiple algorithms that could solve difficult problems, from detecting anomalies in samples during MRI scans, to providing surveillance of an entire country's residents. Within China's mass surveillance, the government uses AI in order to distinguish citizens with less than satisfactory records among crowds. Every new invention or application made with AI comes with its own set of positive and negative effects. Some claim that, as potential uses for AI grow in number, nations need to start regulating it as a dual-use technology.

Chemical

The modern history of chemical weapons can be traced back to the chemical industries of the belligerent nations of World War I, especially that of Germany. Many industrial chemical processes produce toxic intermediary stages, final products, and by-products, and any nation with a chemical industry has the potential to create weaponised chemical agents. Chlorine is a chemical agent found within several household items such as Bleach and provides various benefits with its wide array of applications. However, it can also be used as in chemical weapon.

Biological

That the July 2007 terrorist attacks in central London and at Glasgow airport may have involved National Health Service medical professionals was a recent wake-up call that screening people with access to pathogens may be necessary. The challenge remains to maintain security without impairing the contributions to progress afforded by research.

Reports from the project on building a sustainable culture in dual-use bioethics suggest that, as a result of perceived changes in both science and security over the past decade, several states and multilateral bodies have underlined the importance of making life scientists aware of concerns over dual-use and the legal obligations underpinning the prevention of biological weapons. One of the key mechanisms that have been identified to achieve this is through the education of life science students, with the objective of building what has been termed a “culture of responsibility”.

At the 2008 Meeting of States Parties to the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC), it was agreed by consensus that: States Parties recognized the importance of ensuring that those working in the biological sciences are aware of their obligations under the Convention and relevant national legislation and guidelines...States Parties noted that formal requirements for seminars, modules or courses, including possible mandatory components, in relevant scientific and engineering training programmes and continuing professional education could assist in raising awareness and in implementing the Convention.

The World Health Organization in 2010 developed a "guidance document" for what it called "Dual Use Research of Concern" (DURC) in the life sciences, because "research that is intended obenefit, but which might easily be misapplied to do harm".

Along with several similar stipulations from other states and regional organisations, biosecurity education has become more important. Unfortunately, both the policy and academic literature show that life scientists across the globe are frequently uninformed or underinformed about biosecurity, dual-use, the BTWC and national legislation outlawing biological weapons. Moreover, despite numerous declarations by states and multilateral organisations, the extent to which statements at the international level have trickled down to multifaceted activity at the level of scientists remains limited.

The US federal government (USG) developed at least two policy document in light of the WHO guidance document on DURC. In March 2012, The "United States Government Policy for Oversight of Life Sciences Dual use Research of Concern" was published, in order to establish regular review by oversight bodies into USG-funded DURC. In September 2014, the "United States Government Policy for Institutional Oversight of Life Sciences Dual Use Research of Concern" was published, in order to identify DURC and mitigate it "at the institutional level" such as universities.

Night vision and thermal imaging

Night-vision devices with extraordinary performance characteristics (high gain, specific spectral sensitivity, fine resolution, low noise) are heavily export-restricted by the few states capable of producing them, mainly to limit their proliferation to enemy combatants, but also to slow the inevitable reverse-engineering undertaken by other world powers.

These precision components, such as the image intensifiers used in night vision goggles and the focal plane arrays found in surveillance satellites and thermal cameras, have numerous civil applications which include nature photography, medical imaging, firefighting, and population control of predator species.

Night scenes of wild elephants and rhinos in the BBC
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