A group of Ohio National Guard cyberwarriors have been chosen to take part in a pilot program that aims to secure critical infrastructure that services military installations.
The Cyber Mission Assurance Team was stood up “to fill a gap in mission assurance for Department of Defense critical infrastructure outside the gate," Col. George R. Haynes, chief of cyberspace operations at the National Guard Bureau, said in an April 23 statement.
"Inside the post we're able to do a pretty good job. But once we get outside the post, we don't really have a person that's focused on the area of responsibility outside the post with our mission partners,” he added.
CMAT will focus the companies that providing key infrastructure to military installations. It’s those old industrial control systems that are vulnerable to cyberattacks, the Army said.
The Ohio National Guard CMAT team works mostly in the civilian space and engage with civilians to do vulnerability assessments and control reviews, said team lead Capt. Scott Jackson,
“A good example of would be a utility company that provides a service like power to a Guard base or an active-duty base,” he said. “We would provide assessments in scope of the service that they provide to the base. If there were a vulnerability we could detect that vulnerability and partner with that company to ensure that the risk is mitigated."