DNI Clapper Names Leaders of Cyber Threat Intelligence Integration Center

Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, today announced the leaders of the Cyber Threat Intelligence Integration Center (CTIIC). Director Tonya Ugoretz will lead the center, with Maurice Bland as deputy and Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) Research Director Thomas Donahue as part of the team.

A year ago, President Obama directed Clapper to establish the CTIIC in a move to fuse intelligence collected from multiple agencies probing cyberthreats. The center serves to “connect the dots” regarding malicious foreign cyberthreats against the United States, according to an ODNI press release announcing the leaders.

“CTIIC will lead integrated community analysis of our cyber adversaries and support interagency efforts to develop whole-of-government opportunities against cyberthreats,” Clapper stated in the release. “It will build understanding of cyberthreats to inform government-wide decision-making.”

The center got its start enveloped in controversy, as lawmakers were blindsided by the administration’s announcement of its creation. Its pundits called it a feel-good reaction to highly publicized cyber breaches that would just lead to turf wars with existing federal agencies that already conducted similar work and investigations. 

But similar to ODNI’s other mission centers, such as the National Counterproliferation Center and the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, the new center “integrates an interagency team singularly focused on its core missions, including: providing integrated all-source analysis of foreign cyberthreats and cyber incidents affecting U.S. national interests; helping ensure that the U.S. government has access to the latest integrated intelligence on cyberthreats; and facilitating and supporting efforts by the government to counter these foreign cyberthreats,” the release reads.