National Security Agency

Why Cloud Computing Will Drift In Under FedRAMP CONOPS

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Not only has cybersecurity started to take shape legislatively, cloud computing security has started to take shape administratively in a meaningful way.

You won’t find huge surprises in the grandly named Concept of Operations (CONOPS) for the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program, or FedRAMP. The 47-page document does fill out the plan, long promised by The Office of Management and Budget and the General Services Administration. What might be surprising is how elaborate the procedures and project plan turn out to be. Keep reading →

 /  Published February 22, 2012 at 1:59 PM

CIA’s World Factbook: Intelligence For Every Thinker, Traveler, Soldier, Spy

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The Government Printing Office has just recently released its latest edition of the CIA’s World Factbook–which marks its 50th anniversary in 2012 for the classified version and more than 40 years of publishing the public version.

The 810-page public edition of the CIA’s World Factbook provides not only a timely and valuable source of global information, it also allows us a glimpse into the times and events that necessitated its production. Keep reading →

 /  Published February 2, 2012 at 8:09 AM

Cyber Intelligence: A Clear Cyber Sign Of The Times

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Two separate but related events took place in recent days that individually were important moments in the rapid evolution of the cyber threat domain. When you combine these two events, clearly you can see their significance.

Both events serve as strong indicators of the concern over cyber attacks, as well as a barometer for the current state of digital conflict. Keep reading →

 /  Published February 1, 2012 at 11:12 AM

Situational Awareness: Getting Beyond Lip Service

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Recently, I attended an information security conference in which the term “situational awareness” was mentioned perhaps a hundred times in the course of an afternoon, by everyone from security analysts to chief information security officers. Listening to various conversations, these professionals were attributing capabilities to situational awareness that ranged from underwhelming (“it’s a pipe dream, doomed to failure”), to ridiculously over-wrought (“it will make human security analysts obsolete”).

The truth is somewhere in the middle. But more importantly, it’s time to get beyond the lip service and hype that’s been steadily growing around the term situational awareness and focus on what it really means for federal agencies and their partners.

The term situational awareness has long referred to the idea of “macro” visibility into complex systems, from air traffic control to battlefield command. But in the wake of recent cybersecurity attacks, the term now has a legitimate home in the world of information assurance. Keep reading →

 /  Published July 11, 2011 at 8:16 PM
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