Jane Rathbun, chief information officer of the Department of the Navy and a two-time Wash100 awardee, said cybersecurity should be a top priority when it comes to advancing innovation, Federal News Network reported Tuesday.
That means baking zero trust principles into every aspect of capability development.
“We have to really think about innovation with cyber operations in mind when we talk about future capabilities. I constantly say we have the warfighter requirement. And part of that warfighter requirement is the cyber operators’ requirement. If they cannot command and control the space, we are not secure. You are not secure,” Rathbun told FNN.
Reassessing Capability Development Process
The 2025 Wash100 awardee said she believes the process of developing and rapidly delivering secure capabilities to warfighters needs to be reassessed.
When it comes to developing capabilities, Rathbun cited the need for the operator, acquirer, industry partners and other stakeholders to be involved right from the start of the process.
“In the future, I think everybody needs to be in the same car. The operator … the acquirer, the resource sponsor, the requirements representative of the operator and the industry partner that’s working with us. You’ve got to be all in the car upfront at the beginning,” the CIO noted. “We cannot do it in a linear fashion. We won’t get there fast enough in this space and we will potentially leave you hanging.”
