Fort AP; Hill, VA
Fortress Information Security successfully conducted a full Technical Support and Operational Analysis (TSOA) for the US Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (DEVCOM) March 15-19.
During the five-day exercise, Fortress’ File Integrity Assurance (FIA) module performed as designed--identifying malicious files inserted by the Joint Vulnerability Assessments Branch (JVAB) Red Team.
“This was an excellent opportunity for us to help the Army and the broader DoD team learn in combat-like conditions,” said John Cofrancesco, Fortress Vice President of Business Development. “This was not like office training or exercising in a controlled environment where contractors do all the work. In this case, we provided a short demonstration and then let the soldiers put FIA to work on real-world problems and attempted intrusions—it worked as intended, and they succeeded.”
A TSOA first invites industry, academia, individuals, and laboratories to submit technology white papers addressing innovative technologies and capabilities that can be used in challenging environments, and then invites a select few to participate in mock battleground testing scenarios, where Blue Team defends against Red Team attacks.
Fortress’ solution was one of 165 reviewed by the Army and one of 20 selected to participate in the analysis and testing evolution at Fort AP Hill. Confirming that technology meets expected capability & can withstand Red Team infiltration and stress tests is a key element in demonstrating the applicability for real-world training and eventual use by soldiers in the field.
“These practical performance opportunities in high fidelity training environments are critical to our mission of delivering real solutions to the Department of Defense,” said Andrea Schaumann, Federal Operations Deputy at Fortress. “In this case, we were able to work closely with the Army, but it could easily be the Navy, Marine Corps, or Air Force in future exercises. Our goal is to provide service-member-friendly solutions to complex cyber challenges.”
Fortress also had the opportunity to work with and learn from other exercise participants as combined groups collaborated to protect the Army’s files during the exercise. Building on recent cyberattacks, the Red Team maliciously modified a seemingly harmless presentation slide deck intended for the morning brief, but the FIA module identified the file and users were notified in near-real time. They then isolated the compromised file and thwarted the attempted attack.
“The FIA module performed perfectly and provided a key data point for the assembled participants, particularly with the SolarWinds and Microsoft cyber-attack still so fresh in the minds of many federal agencies,” said Schaumann.
Fortress makes success reliable. Ranked Orlando’s 8th largest technology company by Orlando Business Journal, Fortress’ mission is to secure critical infrastructure by managing supply chain risk technology and service solutions that are configured to your needs.
For more information, contact Chris Servello at provisionadvisors.net at 571.319.6715 or Nick Noll at nnoll@fortressinfosec.com or 407-573-6800.
