{"id":7617,"date":"2022-03-23T12:40:00","date_gmt":"2022-03-23T12:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/?p=7617"},"modified":"2022-08-30T15:54:42","modified_gmt":"2022-08-30T15:54:42","slug":"maryland-national-guard-cyber-operators-hone-their-skills-during-exercise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/2022\/03\/23\/maryland-national-guard-cyber-operators-hone-their-skills-during-exercise\/","title":{"rendered":"Maryland National Guard cyber operators hone their skills during exercise"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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U.S. Air Force 1st Lt. Alexis Eyo, 275th Cyberspace Operations Squadron cyber officer, Maryland Air National Guard works at a computer during Cyber Blitz 22-3 at Warfield Air National Guard Base, Middle River, Maryland on March 23, 2022. The Cyber Blitz exercise is a constantly evolving cyber exercise, which aims to deliver realistic offensive operations and adversarial effects against cyber protection elements conducting defensive operations on a virtual network. (U.S. Air National Guard photo by Master Sgt. Chris Schepers)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Warfield Air National Guard Base, Md. — During a recent election, bad actors accessed the public facing website that was tracking Presidential election results and changed the results the public was seeing in real-time, which skewed in favor of the losing candidate. In the background, cyber operators were fighting back against the bad actors, who were trying to delegitimize the election results.

Fortunately, these events were unfolding during an offensive and defensive cyber exercise called Cyber Blitz 22-3 with cyber professionals from the Maryland National Guard at Warfield Air National Guard Base located at Martin State Airport here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Members of the 175th Cyberspace Operations Group and the 169th Cyber Protection Team, Maryland Air National Guard prepare their workstations before the start of Cyber Blitz 22-3 at Warfield Air National Guard Base, Middle River, Maryland on March 23, 2022. The Cyber Blitz exercise is a constantly evolving cyber exercise, which aims to deliver realistic offensive operations and adversarial effects against cyber protection elements conducting defensive operations on a virtual network. (U.S. Air National Guard photo by Master Sgt. Chris Schepers)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n


The Cyber Blitz exercise is an constantly evolving cyber exercise, which aims to deliver realistic offensive operations and adversarial effects against cyber protection team elements conducting defensive operations on a virtual network.

The exercise participants were split into four cells: white, red, blue, and black. Each team had their own responsibilities and roles during the exercise but exercise planners wanted all of the teams to work together to reach their mission objectives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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U.S. Air Force 1st Lt. Alexis Eyo (left), cyber officer assigned to the 275th Operations Support Squadron, and U.S. Air Force Maj. Charles Gruver, 275th Operations Support Squadron commander, talk about strategies before the start of Cyber Blitz 22-3 at Warfield Air National Guard Base, Middle River, Maryland on March 23, 2022. The Cyber Blitz exercise is a constantly evolving cyber exercise, which aims to deliver realistic offensive operations and adversarial effects against cyber protection elements conducting defensive operations on a virtual network. (U.S. Air National Guard photo by Master Sgt. Chris Schepers)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n


The aggressors, who were attempting to gain access to private networks, were on the red team. They used the tools that are available to them to try and disrupt day-to-day operations.

\u201cThe red team is trying to infiltrate the network using open source tools to validate their skill sets,\u201d explained U.S. Air Force Capt. Brandon Krantz, cyber officer assigned to the 275th Operations Support Squadron. \u201cThey leave artifacts as evidence of their actions.\u201d

The blue team is the defender of the network and is working against the red team to ensure those bad actors do not infiltrate their networks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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U.S. Air Force Maj. Charles Gruver, 275th Operations Support Squadron flight commander, Maryland Air National Guard prepares his workstation before the start of Cyber Blitz 22-3 at Warfield Air National Guard Base, Middle River, Maryland on March 23, 2022. The Cyber Blitz exercise is a constantly evolving cyber exercise, which aims to deliver realistic offensive operations and adversarial effects against cyber protection elements conducting defensive operations on a virtual network. (U.S. Air National Guard photo by Master Sgt. Chris Schepers)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n



\u201cThe blue team is working to secure the network through network hardening techniques such as using firewalls, network devices, and port security,\u201d explained Krantz. \u201cThe goal is to only leave open the necessary ports and applications for the end user to perform their day-to-day tasks while minimizing the overall attack surface.\u201d

The white cell, which was led by U.S. Army 1st Lt. Clarence Nowell, the mission element lead from the 169th Cyber Protection Team, Maryland Army National Guard, was responsible for coordinating the action between the other cells participating in the exercise.

\u201cWe wanted to create an exercise where all of the teams were working together,\u201d explained Nowell. \u201cA lot of times during exercises and even real-world activities we tend to work in a silo and we wanted to get away from that.\u201d

The Cyber Blitz training environment, which was created using the CATTS system from CyberCents that was originally created to exclusively host offensive cyber operations, was created and monitored by the black cell. Mr. Dorsey Bohan, cyber support analyst assigned to the 275th Operations Support Squadron, led that team.

\u201cWe test everything beforehand to make sure the attackers\u2019 and defenders’ access to the network allows them to do their jobs,\u201d explained Bohan. \u201cDuring the last Cyber Blitz, we used our CATTS system, which is designed to be used as an automated attack [network] but we configured it for this exercise to have a live red and intel team on it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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U.S. Army 1st Lt. Clarence Nowell, mission element lead for the 169th Cyber Protection Team, Maryland Army National Guard prepares his workstation before the start of Cyber Blitz 22-3 at Warfield Air National Guard Base, Middle River, Maryland on March 23, 2022. The Cyber Blitz exercise is a constantly evolving cyber exercise, which aims to deliver realistic offensive operations and adversarial effects against cyber protection elements conducting defensive operations on a virtual network. (U.S. Air National Guard photo by Master Sgt. Chris Schepers)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n


The evolution of the annual cyber exercise was evident during this iteration as participants came from the Maryland Air National Guard\u2019s 175th Cyberspace Operations Group and 175th Intelligence Squadron and the Maryland Army National Guard\u2019s 169th Cyber Protection Team and 110th Information Operations Battalion.

\u201cThe integration of the Army and Air has been key to understanding different techniques and terminology that is used between the branches of service,\u201d said U.S. Air Force Maj. Charles Gruver, 275th Operations Support Squadron flight commander of current operations. \u201cWhen we get ready to deploy, we will normally be working in a joint environment, so this exercise is great preparation for future operations.\u201d

On the final day of the exercise, leadership from the National Guard Bureau Cyber Division were present for the out-briefing and were able to learn about the ever-growing exercise at the 175th Wing.

One of the visitors, U.S. Air Force Col. Joed Carbonell, Cyber Division (J36) chief and former 175th Cyberspace Operations Group deputy commander, expressed his excitement at the evolution of the Cyber Blitz exercise.

\u201cSo it started as only exercise and it was really tough getting other squadrons to participate,\u201d said Carbonell. \u201cAnd now, fast forward to today, not only do you have players from outside of the wing but now you have a completely joint-integrated and self-generated exercise that they do every two months. This is what the guard does and I am continuously blown away with how they do it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Warfield Air National Guard Base, Md. — During a recent election, bad actors accessed the public facing website that was tracking Presidential election results and changed the results the public was seeing in real-time, which skewed in favor of the losing candidate. In the background, cyber operators were fighting back against the bad actors, who  Read the Rest…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":160,"featured_media":7650,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7617","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7617","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/160"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7617"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7617\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7763,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7617\/revisions\/7763"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7650"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}