U.S. Cyber Command and the National Guard have developed a program designed to facilitate sharing of data and allow authorities to address a ransomware attack and other cyber threats posed by foreign adversaries.
The Cyber 9-Line program is a template of questions used by National Guard units to immediately share data on cyber threats with Cybercom’s Cyber National Mission Force, the command said Tuesday. CNMF will then act on the collected data and provide feedback to the participating units, which will then share the information to state and local governments to address the threat.
The Cyber 9-Line is the initial step in the information exchange program developed by the Joint Cyber Command and Control program office in late 2019. The second step marks the use of the command’s Big Data Platform, which provides access to malware reports and other previous threats and helps Cybercom counter foreign threats.
“This level of cooperation and feedback provides local, state and Department of Defense partners with a holistic view of threats occurring in the United States and abroad,” said U.S. Army Brig. Gen. William Hartman, Cybercom’s Election Security Group lead and CNMF commander. “Dealing with a significant cyber incident requires a whole-of-government defense; bidirectional lines on communication and data sharing enables the collective effort to defend elections.”
Cybercom said the Cyber 9-Line was used in late January when Dorchester County in Maryland reported a ransomware attack.
