MAF Features the US Navy Submarines and Economic CyberSecurity

MILITARY AFFAIRS FORUM

Date & Time:  Wednesday, May 13, 7:30 – 9:00 a.m.
Place:  La Quinta Inn | 1425 E. 27th St. | Tacoma 98421
Register: Online here.

Event Sponsor:

The event fee will be complementary hosted by our sponsor for invited Military Personnel who reserve with Janice Hutchins, (253) 683-4882.

AGENDA:

CAPTAIN Brian N. Humm
Commodore
Submarine Squadron 19 

Captain Humm served at sea as a Junior Officer on USS TINOSA (SSN 606), Engineer on USS TAUTOG (SSN 639) and Executive Officer in USS FLORIDA (SSBN 728) BLUE. He commanded USS BUFFALO (SSN 715) from May 2005 to July 2007 and USS OHIO (SSGN 726) BLUE from November 2010 to December 2012.

Ashore, he served as the Flag Lieutenant to the Commander, Submarine Group 2 in Groton, CT and the Submarine Squadron 3 Engineer in Pearl Harbor, HI. In August 2004, he completed a tour as the Submarine Executive Officer/Post-Executive Officer Detailer at the Bureau of Naval Personnel in Millington, TN. Following command of USS BUFFALO, he was the Senior Member, Tactical Readiness Evaluation Team, Pacific Fleet Submarine Force and served in J8 at U.S. Strategic Command as Chief of the Space and Global ISR Division. Most recently, CAPT Humm served as the Director for Operations (N3) on the staff of the Commander, Submarine Force Atlantic.

Cyber Security as a Regional Economic Issue
Michael K. Hamilton
Cybersecurity Policy Advisor
State of Washington Office of CIO

Join Cybersecurity Policy Advisor Mike Hamilton as he share an all-state strategy to treat infrastructure as an economic issue, and how the strategy centers around workforce development, infrastructure protection and research.

NEXT ACTIVITY
Evergreen Fleet Cruise:  Wed., June 24, Tacoma Yacht Club

ANNOUNCEMENTS
Visit the “Tacoma-Pierce Co. Veteran & Business Service” Facebook page.  "Like" the page to stay informed of workplace opportunities for transitioning vets and vets as well as current info.

Cyberwarfare Czar Set

MILITARY AFFAIRS FORUM

CYBERWARFARE

Featuring: Howard Schmidt, the cyber-security czar for the Obama Administration

Howard A. Schmidt has had a long distinguished career in defense, law enforcement and corporate security spanning more than 40 years. 

He brings together talents in business, defense, intelligence, law enforcement, privacy, academia and international relations through his distinguished career. 

Schmidt currently is Special Assistant to the President and the Cybersecurity Coordinator for the federal government. 

In this role Mr. Schmidt is responsible for coordinating interagency cybersecurity policy development and implementation and for coordinating engagement with federal, state, local, international and private sector cybersecurity partners.

Date:  Friday, March 9
Time:  7:30 - 9:00 a.m.
Place:   Courtyard by Marriott : St. Helens Room
             1515 Commerce Street : Tacoma 98402
Parking:  Free as noted in the information below
Price:  $21 members by March 5
            $25 non-members and Member Walk-ins
                   after March 5
RSVP: Register: Janice Hutchins, (253) 627.2175 x100

PARKING*
 

There are three lots to choose from, and as you can see in the map below, one LOT G is right across the street on the same level as the Courtyard Marriott’s Commerce Street entrance (see symbol below). And two others A and B, up one level.

 

Again, simply take 15th street up the hill one block from Pacific Avenue to Commerce, and turn left in past the Marriott. The first lot you will come to is LOT G on your right.

 

If you find lot G to be full when you come to it (and it most often is not), simply continue along Commerce as shown on the map below, and turn right on Jefferson and right again on Broadway back into the other lots, A and B, both of which are also free. Then simply use the stairs to come down to Commerce, as these two lots are up one level.

Cut through the Commerce entrance of the Courtyard Marriott to Pacific Avenue and the Pacific Grill Events Center (see symbol below). And you are “home free.”

The Right Attitude

The expectations for most of us is that the military takes its job seriously.

Our course, we also expect that the rest of us don't, as evidenced by Bill Maudlin, Beetle Bailey, MASH, Dr. Strangelove and Catch-22.  (So, it's alright to admit that you too do tell "war stories.")

But, to the point of this particular blog:

PC World, among others, recently reported on the effort by Wired magazine to decode the code on the U.S. Cyber Command seal. On the seal’s inner gold ring is a code: 9ec4c12949a4f31474f299058ce2b22a

Wired magazine challenged its readers to be the first to decode the cryptic message and offered a prize of a Danger Room T-shirt or a ticket to the International Spy Museum for the first to do so.

As it turns out, the real meaning of the cypher isn't very exciting at all, unless government gobbledygook gets your adrenaline flowing. Accordingly, the figures in the gold ring translate into this:

"USCYBERCOM plans, coordinates, integrates, synchronizes and conducts activities to: direct the operations and defense of specified Department of Defense information networks and; prepare to, and when directed, conduct full spectrum military cyberspace operations in order to enable actions in all domains, ensure US/Allied freedom of action in cyberspace and deny the same to our adversaries."

Now if this combination of geekiness humor and bureaucratic messaging isn't just so appropriate to that oxymoron "military intelligence," I don't know what isn't.

HASC Moves on Budget

A House Armed Services subcommittee today approved a measure authorizing a significant boost in spending for special operations as part of a bill setting national security policy for fiscal 2010.

The Subcommittee on Terrorism, Unconventional Threats and Capabilities — the first of six panels to act on the bill — approved by voice vote provisions authorizing spending for science and technology programs, cybersecurity and, perhaps most notably, for everything U.S. Special Operations Command sought in the budget and more.

“We wanted to give them the tools and capabilities they need to do the things we ask them to do,” said Adam Smith , D-Wash., the subcommittee’s chairman, said of the U.S. special forces.

Cyber Threats Hare Raising

With the assessment by the GAO (glad someone's accountable) that the nation's information security is "at risk" from cyber threats, also comes an assessment on how difficult it is to do non-kinetic cyber activity, like shooting behind the rabbits.

Maj. Gen. William Lord, commander of the USAF Cyber Command (Provisional), statement that: it is easier to get approval to do a kinetic (read "bomb") strike with a 2,000 lb. bomb than it is for us to do a non-kinetic (no "boom!") cyber activity. Lord, who has been nominated to become the AF Chief of Warfighting Integration was speaking to an industry association recently.

The Cyberspace Policy Review is a 76-page report released with a White House announcement that the president will be creating a new cybersecurity office and czar, as well as a privacy and civil liberties official to oversee the government’s cybersecurity plans. The cybersecurity report provides a list of wide-ranging guidelines advising President Barack Obama on how the government should proceed in its national plan to secure cyberspace.

It touches on everything from establishing communication networks for emergency response teams to the role government should play in the protection of critical infrastructure networks and whether or not entities that experience a breach should have to notify governments and law enforcement agencies. Privacy and civil liberties concerns receive a repeated nod, with privacy being mentioned in the report more than five dozen times.

Students Participating in Cyber Defense Event

This weekend, students from the UWT's Institute of Technology will be participating in the 2nd Annual Pacific Rim Regional Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition on the Microsoft campus.

Members of the student organization, the Grey Hat Group, will be presented with a preconfigured systems of a fictitious company that they are tasked to operate. Then, as described by the competition's web site.

The evil red team, which sits next door, however, will attempt to vandalize and break into this network. The student teams need to defend against the attacks of this red team. In particular, the goals for each team are to:

• fulfill assigned business tasks (so-called injects)
• keep services operational
• prevent break-ins by the red team

Students are scored based on the goals above. The team with the most points of the two day event will be the winner of the Pacific Rim Regional Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition and will proceed to the National competition.

Justin Carton, the Grey Hat Group president, has been working the group through practice sessions to get them all prepared. However, a former founder of the GHG and alumni to the program here at the Institute, Mary Jane Kelly, will be part of the "evil red team". She and another alumni John Hernandez, both from Casaba Security, will be tough to handle.

The Center for Information Assurance and Cybersecurity, the University of Washington and Microsoft are helping to put on the event. You have undoubtedly heard of the last two but perhaps not the first. The CIAC is a Pacific Northwest research, education, industry and government community that provides innovation and leadership in the protection of critical public and private information infrastructure, and provides well educated information assurance and cybersecurity at all professional levels.

Guest Author: Andrew Fry, Institute of Technology, University of Washington Tacoma. Good luck to all.