Six-Month Cyber Defense Costs U.S. $100M
Michael Bruno michael_bruno@aviationweek.com 
U.S. Defense Department networks are attacked thousands of times a day, according to leading combat commanders in the field, and defending DOD's Global Information Grid from cyber attacks has cost the U.S. military more than $100 million over the past six months alone.
"Pay me now or pay me later," said Army Brig. Gen. John Davis, deputy commander of Joint Task Force Global Network Operations. "It would be nice to spend that money proactively to put things in place so we'd be more active and proactive in posture rather than cleaning up after the fact."
Davis and Air Force Gen. Kevin Chilton, chief of U.S. Strategic Command, spoke to a cybersecurity conference in Omaha, Neb., recently. According to a DOD statement, Chilton reiterated his call for combatant commanders to take responsibility for the cyber realm as they do air, land and sea in their areas of operation.
"We need to change the way we conduct ourselves in cyberspace and hold our military folks to the same high standards that we hold our air, land and sea operators to," Chilton said.
As in land, sea, air and outer space domains, the United States seeks to retain freedom of action in cyberspace too, the StratCom commander said. More training is needed for personnel to launch both defensive and offensive operations, from high to the low ends, Chilton argued. StratCom operates the GIG.
The $100 million was in manpower, time, contractors, tools, technology and procedures, according to Davis, whose organization is responsible for defensive and offensive operations in cyberspace.
Chilton last month told lawmakers that the United States remains vulnerable across a swath of cyber threats, but he asserted that the military is indeed making progress on the issue (Aerospace DAILY, March 19). Attacks originate from a range of sources, including bored teenagers causing mischief to organized nation-state aggressors and criminal elements that fall in between.
Photo credit: Aviation Week & Space Technology
