Obering Sites Need for Dynamic Cyber Defense

Cyber 1.2 featured speaker: Lt. Gen. Henry (Trey) Obering, III, USAF, Ret., senior vice president, Booz Allen Hamilton, began his presentation by saying that he is interested in exploring the best ways to integrate cyber and space, citing three things that need to happen: Cyber must be recognized as a domain; we must have networks to protect our cyber networks; we will need a large training and education effort.

Obering said reports of sophisticated cyber attacks on satellites have surfaced; saying that this is not a future threat, but a present one, adding that we can't think of defending satellites against cyber attack in the same way as we defend against other attacks. He said that the cyber domain needs to be robustly understood and characterized, and should be factored into the design of satellites.

No matter how carefully we design our systems, Obering said, no system is completely secure, so a dynamic defense is needed. In answering questions, he reiterated that operating effectively in contested cyber domain involves considerations of cyber security throughout the systems engineering process.

See photos here. See video here.

Cyber 1.2 was held on April 16, immedaitely before the 28th National Space Symposium.

For more information, Obering pointed audience to http://www.cyberhub.com.

This article is part of Space Watch: May 2012 (Volume: 11, Issue: 5).