Merle Maigre, pictured, Director, NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (CCD COE), is among invited speakers at the ‘cyber threat intelligence’ part of the SCTX 2018 conference, itself part of Security & Counter Terror Expo, on March 6 and 7 at London Olympia. We put a couple of questions to her. She’s speaking on day one, Tuesday, March 6, at 10.15am.
Question: We all know Nato, but what has it to do with cyber security? Is it for its own facilities’ cyber security and / or Nato members?
Answer: Today, the cyber space is not only a playground for criminals, but has become the separate military domain. Cyber attacks have already become and will also be a significant component of any future conflicts. Therefore strengthening cyber defences is not only important for individuals and industry, but also nations and international organisations protecting our modern lifestyle.
Cyber defence is a top priority for NATO. Already in 2014 NATO allies agreed in Wales that international law applies in cyberspace and cyber defence is part of NATO’s core task of collective defence. The allies at the Warsaw Summit in 2016 declared cyberspace a domain of NATO operations, where the Alliance must be as effective in as in air, land and sea. NATO’s main cyber defence responsibility is to defend their own networks, while allies protect theirs. However, NATO has rapid reaction cyber defence teams on stand-by, to help allies cope with a cyber attack if necessary. Also the Alliance is looking into determining the best ways how to integrate cyber tools of the Allies in NATO missions and operations. In the future, Alliance plans to involve the capabilities of their member nations just as they do ships and aircraft, for Alliance operations and missions.
Q: What is the Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence?
A: The NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (CCDCOE) is a NATO-accredited cyber defence hub conducting research, training and exercises in four core areas – technology, strategy, operations and law. The CCDCOE today has 20 NATO and EU nations as its members. The heart of the Centre is a diverse group of international experts including legal scholars, policy and strategy specialists who join forces with technology researchers, all from military, government and industry backgrounds. Our unique set up enables the Centre to support our member nations, NATO and international community with interdisciplinary expertise in cyber defence.
In ten years since establishment the CCDCOE has earned recognition for its unique flagships – the world´s largest most complex international live-fire cyber defence exercise Locked Shields, international conference and community-building event CyCon and Tallinn Manual 2.0, the most comprehensive guide on how international law applies to cyber operations.
NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence in Tallinn performs an important role among various international efforts. The NATO cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (NATO CCD COE) promotes lifelong learning on cyber security. As of January 2018, NATO CCDCOE is responsible for identifying and coordinating education and training solutions in the field of cyber defence operations for all NATO bodies across the Alliance. To best meet the training needs of our Allies, Partners and NATO, we provide courses in different formats and locations, covering a broad range of topics within the technical, legal, strategic, and operational cyber security domain. Our training courses are based on our latest research and lessons learned from exercises.
Q: The magazine’s typical readers are security managers for a bank, retailer, university and so on, that face cyber threats like physical threats, and are doing their own IT security – is there any overlap there with Nato’s government-level work, or is it purely (though necessary) part of the same effort? What sort of people are the Nato cyber centre and indeed businesses and us all facing in cyberspace – individual hackers, crime groups, nation states? What are they after and what can we do to protect ourselves?
A: Technologies and threats in cyber space are in constant change, our dependance on digital lifestyle recognises no geographical borders nor makes a difference between domains – any technology or a system is a potential target for a cyber attack. While the businesses and industry might be more concerned with cyber crime and espionage for economic gain, then nations and international organisations such as NATO are defending against growing risks related to state actors in cyber space. Cyber operations have started to play a key role in the toolbox of political and military intelligence-gathering and information operations. Another growing concern for nations are the potential targeted attacks aimed at our critical infrastructure.
Investments into digital innovation must go hand-in-hand with serious commitment to cyber security as well. Considering the interdependencies in the cyber realm nations have to take measures to protect their vital services, critical information infrastructure and military systems too.
One of the CCDCOE’s unique features is providing interdisciplinary approach on cyber from the perspective of law, strategy, operations and technology focusing on current hot topics and emerging threats affecting both critical infrastructure and military systems. For example recent Crossed Swords exercise organised by the Centre joined together Critical Information Infrastructure (CII) providers and military units, involving the mobile network technologies, drone surveillance and power substation. In 2017 at Locked Shields exercise teams practiced under intense pressure the protection of large scale SCADA system controlling the power grid, military AirC2 system, military surveillance drone and Ground Station controlling the drone and Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs).
In the real world we cannot separate cyber domain in military from cyber domain in business. Cyber in different domains still makes use of the same components, protocols and technologies designed by the people and used by the people. In that sense everything starts with basic cyber hygiene, and ends with the national cyber defence strategy, but we also cannot stress enough the importance of interdisciplinary approach, cooperation of both like-minded nations and civil and military spheres, lifelong learning and practical exercises.
About the CCD COE
It’s a multinational and interdisciplinary hub of cyber defence; based in the Estonian capital, Tallinn. Visit https://ccdcoe.org/.
