JMETC National Cyber Range (NCR) Complex
Abstract
The National Cyber Range Complex (NCRC) is comprised of cyber ranges and a secure distributed network infrastructure to service the cyber range user community. The NCRC currently consists of five functional cyber ranges, including the National Cyber Range in Florida as well as four Regional Service Delivery Points (RSDP) located in Hawaii, Alabama, Maryland, and Massachusetts. To enhance DoD cyber range test and training capability and capacity, the NCRC is being expanded with additional cyber ranges co-located with key Service organizations to support an increase of cyber testing of DoD systems as well as training of cyber warfighters. The JMETC Multiple Independent Level of Security (MILS) Network (JMN) currently links 58 sites across the DoD, industry, and academia, providing secure access between cyber ranges, laboratories, and facilities. Both the cyber ranges and the network infrastructure are accredited to support multiple levels of security classifications, specifically configured to meet particular cyber event requirements. The NCRC investments have been aligned to support the National Defense Strategy in improving cyber defense, cyber resilience, and the continued integration of cyber capabilities into the full spectrum of military operations. The NCRC conducts cyberspace test and training events for the full spectrum of DoD customers including research, development, acquisition, testing, training and operational Cyber Mission Forces (CMF). The NCRC executes wide variety of event types including science and technology (S&T) demonstrations, developmental test and evaluation (DT&E), operational test and evaluation (OT&E), security controls assessments, cyberspace operations training, refinement of cyberspace tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTP) Development, forensics/malware analysis) and cyberspace operations mission rehearsal. The NCRC enables acquisition programs to conduct cybersecurity test and evaluation in an operationally representative cyberspace environment enabling identification, validation and mitigation of vulnerabilities. The NCRC also supports training, mission rehearsal and certification of the CMF in support of US Cyber Command by enabling operational forces to efficiently evaluate cyber warfighting capability in a realistic joint mission environment. The NCRC provides secure facilities, technology, processes, and workforce to rapidly create hi-fidelity, mission-representative friendly, neutral, and adversarial cyberspace environments. The NCRC also facilitates integration of distributed organizations with different missions and workforce relevant to cyber operations (e.g., cyber operators, penetrations testers, cyber assessors, cyber observers, cyber analysts, etc.). The NCRC supports cyber activities across of a full spectrum of DoD systems, including weapon platforms, C4I systems, business systems, network devices, and other systems vulnerable to a cyber-attack. The NCRC extensively utilizes automation to minimize human error, to reduce the time required to set-up for a cyber event, and to ensure repeatable results. In addition, the NCRC employs post-event sanitization techniques on all assets after exposure to malicious code to restore back to a known, clean state, which allows for reuse in future events. The NCRC has a multidisciplinary workforce with software, systems, network, virtualization, automation, system administration, and cybersecurity subject matter expertise. In support of successful planning and execution of hosted events, the NCRC workforce helps users define and refine their event objectives, assists with identifying and prioritizing potential vulnerabilities, designs virtualized cyber environments, develops customized traffic generation and instrumentation solutions, integrates 3rd party hardware and software, executes cyber events on behalf of the user, provides cooperative vulnerability and penetration assessments, performs detailed cyber analysis, and delivers detailed reports on the results. In addition, the NCRC workforce supports both the Executive Agent for Cyber Test Ranges and the Executive Agent for Cyber Training Ranges, to identify and address relevant needs, define and promulgate standards, and seek efficiencies through focused investments.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Project
- Publication Date
- Oct 01, 2020
- Source ID
- 088_0605100D8Z_6_0400_PB_2020
Related Documents
- Root: Joint Mission Environment Test Capability (JMETC)
- Child Accomplishment: JMETC National Cyber Range (NCR) Complex