Cyber

The Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification Accreditation Body (CMMC-AB), the sole authoritative source for operationalizing CMMC assessments and training by the U.S. Defense Department, has announced the formation of a cybersecurity Industry Advisory Council’s (IAC).

The CMMC-AB IAC mission is to provide a unified voice as representatives of organizations seeking certification to provide to the Defense Department and the accreditation board feedback, input and recommendations for implementing the CMMC.

Working from home or remotely has always been a significant challenge for our federal workforce. The obstacles are not so much technical, rather it is the sensitivity of the data and communications that must traverse the network, and the sophistication, resources and determination of the adversarial powers that seek to disrupt or compromise them.

Unlike the commercial marketplace where a security breech might result in lost revenue, stolen IP or a fine, in the federal mission space the cost of failure could be the loss of critical infrastructure or even loss of life.

NATO is at risk of losing its technology edge because of emerging and disruptive technologies increasingly developed within the civil sector. The growth of peer competitors’ determination, especially China, and the decline of technology education in Western countries are eroding the advantage they once skillfully held.

To address this state of affairs, the organization’s defense ministers are examining a number of activities. As a part of this initiative, the NATO Industrial Advisory Group (NIAG) conducted a study to provide the industry view of the implications of emerging and disruptive technologies (EDTs) and Chinese advances in defense operations and military capability development.

The federal government has been taking zero trust more seriously. Although a significant part of it has yet to be implemented, some initial work has been completed with zero trust network access, yet the outside-in approach to zero trust and complexity remains. But the more important aspect of zero trust relates to application and workload connections, which is what attackers care about and is not being protected today.

This “other side” of zero trust and a host-based micro-segmentation approach will lead to greater security and will stop the lateral movement of malware. Constituting multiple pilot projects is the best way forward in the inside-out approach to zero trust.

With ransomware and malware attacks on the rise across the globe, leaders need to be positioned for incident response before a breach occurs. Most businesses are not prepared for the earth-splitting impact a ransomware attack will present to their organization. Many organizations are deploying the “HOPE” strategy against ransomware. They hope every day that they aren’t targeted, because they know a ransomware attack will present a monumental financial and organizational challenge. Commercial businesses have paid hundreds of millions of dollars to black hat hackers for the rights to the decryption key to restore their network. Ransomware can shut down computers and lock out users until they pay hackers a ransom.

Recent actions by cybermarauders have illustrated the importance of the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) thrust by the Defense Department, and new assessment guides can help lay the groundwork for companies to meet CMMC requirements, according to government officials.These and other key points were presented at the AFCEA CMMC Lunch and Learn session held on March 19. The last of a series of CMMC lunch presentations, this session focused on requirements for the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). But, government experts addressed several other key issues related to CMMC implementation.

In the ever-growing and complexifying ecosystem of the Internet of Things (IoT), demand for connectivity is stronger than ever and only bound to intensify. Statista predicts that by 2025, there will be 38.6 billion devices connected to the internet, which will put even more pressure on organizations to monitor their infrastructures.

For system administrators, there are several obstacles to keeping pathways clear and the flow of data smooth. Here are a few of the most common roadblocks when it comes to IoT monitoring, as well as a few ways to overcome them.

Roadblock #1: Managing different interfaces for different devices

The 35th annual AFCEA TechNet Indo-Pacific conference featured a panel with top female leaders addressing cybersecurity workforce issues. Having ever-present cybersecurity training, reaching a younger audience on their level and leveraging women who may be seeking a second career are all ways to close the cybersecurity workforce gaps, the leaders said.

The entire nation must engage in an informed debate about cybersecurity and how to stop the damage being inflicted by adversaries through cyberspace, says the director of intelligence for the U.S. Cyber Command. Brig. Gen. Matteo Martemucci, USAF, J-2 for the U.S. Cyber Command, says this debate must explore whether the roles played in cyber defense stay the way they are or change.

The U.S. Defense Department already is looking beyond its massive $600 million investment in 5G experiments announced in October. Plans include a second round of experiments and the potential for expanding efforts with other government agencies and with international partners.

People who have come of age in the information era often believe they have experienced a landmark shift in world events and lifestyles. But that which has taken place over the past 35 years pales in comparison to the existential change taking shape with the coming wireless revolution.

Understanding this coming revolution requires thinking beyond the physical devices we carry in our pockets. Hardware does not solely define what wireless connectivity is about. The capabilities will go much further than those devices, and it is these new and expanded capabilities that will prove to be the global game changers.

The U.S. Army is applying its cyber expertise across the defense spectrum as it blends tactical and strategic capabilities while helping the departmentwide cyber mission. This ranges from operational activities to training, and the effort spans both defensive and offensive cyber missions.

Some of these points were explained in day 2 of the first episode in the TechNet Augusta Virtual Solutions Series, airing February 16-17. Col. John Transue Jr., USA, director, Army Capability Manager (ACM) Cyber, described how the separation between tactical and strategic capabilities is blurring as the Army applies elements of one to the other.

Companies preparing for Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) should beware of firms that are promising to get them certified, said a government official. Stacy Bostjanick, director of CMMC, Office of the Under Secretary of Defense (A&S), stated that any firms claiming to be able to do that are not capable of that function yet.

The Defense Department has an information warfare (IW) problem. While the information environment continues to grow exponentially in importance and ubiquity, rapidly transforming the character of competition and war, there is no organization within the department that directs, synchronizes and coordinates IW planning and operations.

U.S. Cyber Command serves this very purpose for cyber operations, as do its service components. But this necessarily anchors the focus of American IW on a single information related capability (IRC), at the expense of the many other IRCs and their ability to generate military advantage.

The cybersecurity of civil government, critical infrastructure and business infrastructure remains uneven. Worrying reports of ransomware affecting city and county governments as well as local health care organizations have put leaders and administrators, and infrastructure operators on edge.

The Defense Digital Service (DDS) and HackerOne announced the launch of the DDS’s latest bug bounty program with HackerOne. It is the eleventh such program for DDS and HackerOne and the third with the U.S. Department of the Army.

Hack the Army 3.0 is a security test— time-bound and hacker-powered—aimed at revealing vulnerabilities so they can be resolved before they are exploited by adversaries. The bug bounty program will run from January 6, 2021, through February 17, 2021, and is open to both military and civilian participants.

Germany, the United States and many other nations are facing a more diverse, complex, quickly evolving and demanding security environment than at any time since the end of the Cold War. The resulting challenges to national and international security and stability could be as harmful to societies, economies and institutions as conventional attacks.

The U.S. Army upped the tempo when Gen. Mark Milley, USA, fired off his first message to the force in August 2015 as the newly sworn-in Army Chief of Staff: “Readiness for ground combat is—and will remain—the U.S. Army’s No. 1 priority.” Today, Gen. Milley is the chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Army has rebuilt its tactical readiness through a transformational process that it is now expanding to focus on strategic readiness.

As cybersecurity threats become more sophisticated, organizations need a way to quickly detect and stop an attack or track and analyze its after-effects for clues. One important tool available to cybersecurity analysts is deep packet analysis.

Deep packet analysis, or packet sniffing, is a data processing technique that allows organizations to monitor network traffic for signs of intrusion, and to block or reroute it if an attack is detected. But its most important feature is the ability to record data traffic, allowing analysts to conduct detailed investigations into the nature of a cyber incident.

Experts have issued fresh warnings to U.S. citizens over the enormous amount of sensitive, personal information being routinely captured and commoditized, and that this same information is being weaponized by the country’s adversaries. A panel at the recent AFCEA TechNet Cyber conference highlighted that data gathering by Facebook, WhatsApp and Google presents a significant risk to both individuals and the nation.

The Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, or CISA, reported yesterday that the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Office of the Director of Intelligence and CISA itself had created a Cyber Unified Coordination Group. The move was necessary given the alarming cyber compromise, a Trojan-style attack by threat-actor UNC2452 with ties to Russia. The attack, identified by FireEye, reached North American, European, Asian and Middle Eastern governments, technology firms, telecommunications, consulting companies and other entities, the company said. 

Amassing data serves little purpose if it is not processed into knowledge, and that knowledge is largely wasted if leaders don’t understand what they have and how it can best be used.

That was just part of the message on empowering knowledge delivered by a NASA expert on the second day of TechNet Cyber 2020, AFCEA’s virtual event held December 1-3. Tiffany Smith, chief knowledge officer and information technology manager in NASA’s Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate, emphasized the importance of understanding both the knowledge at hand, knowledge priorities and the people who will exploit that knowledge to the fullest.

The Joint Force Headquarters-Department of Defense Information Network (JFHQ-DODIN) is partnering with a broad base of national security organizations and industry to counter an increasing threat to U.S. forces and their operations worldwide. The JFHQ-DODIN seeks to meet this challenge with four primary focus areas that include new technologies such as automation to move data, hone commanders’ information and defend the network.

The Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) is leading three different efforts that are working toward agile electromagnetic spectrum operations. While one focuses largely on improved spectrum usage by the military, the main focal point is to share bandwidth with civilian users in a way that does not inhibit either military operations or public bandwidth uses.

These three efforts were discussed by experts at TechNet Cyber 2020, AFCEA’s virtual event being held December 1-3. Leading officials with DISA and industry are outlining challenges and opportunities beckoning the defense communications community.