Cyber Battleground Range helps keep up with training demands for the U.S. Army
NewsJune 29, 2015
ABERDEEN PROVING GROUNDS, Md. To help validate soldier’s cyber security skills, the U.S. Army Communications-Electronics Command (CECOM) is setting up Cyber Battleground Range. The training ground is expected to open up to all units in late summer of 2015 and will provide soldiers with a realistic environment that applies the skills learned in a classroom training curriculum.
"The genesis of the effort was with the 7th CPB, who requested we develop this for them," says Col. Kim Bivin, director for the Field Support, Logistics and Readiness Center, CECOM. "Our training support leadership stepped in, and after six months of hard work, we opened for business in February."
According to Army officials, as the cyber range is expanded for Army-wide use the range will provide an operationally realistic environment with functionality for remote participation through CECOM’s Learning Management Platform.
The range’s realistic environment offers repeatable processes, access to enterprise tools typically not available in smaller scale tests labs. The environments come with threat scenario development and threat automation capabilities.
CECOM can also configure scenarios to support multiple environments through the cyber range and has incorporated real world cyber actor/cyber threat characterization and dynamic threat actor/ agent capability into training. The cyber range delivers a persistent, continuously maintained environment to reduce the timeline and costs between training planning and event execution.
"We really have the ability to tailor training programs per a unit's specific needs," says Martinez. "The goal is to map out a training program so that when soldiers use the range, they are able to address learning needs most critical to their mission, as opposed to a cookie-cutter training curriculum."
