The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has selected eight teams that will compete in the systems competition final event of DARPA’s Subterranean Challenge. 

The DARPA- and self-funded teams will have their robots look for trapped survivors, invisible gas, cell phones and other common items in underground environments at the Louisville Mega Cavern in Kentucky as part of the SubT Challenge final event that will take place from Sept. 21 to 23, DARPA said Monday.

The eight teams are the CollaborativE walking & flying RoBots for autonomous ExploRation in Underground Settings or CERBERUS; Coordinated Robotics; Collaborative SubTerranean Autonomous Resilient Robots or CoSTAR; CSIRO Data61; Czech Technical University – Center for Robotics and Autonomous Systems – Northern Robotics Laboratory or CTU-CRAS-NORLAB; Explorer; Multi-agent Autonomy with Radar-Based Localization for Exploration or MARBLE; and Robotika.

The CERBERUS team includes the University of Nevada, Reno; University of California, Berkeley; Sierra Nevada; Flyability; Oxford Robotics Institute; and Norwegian University for Science and Technology.

Coordinated Robotics is composed of California State University; California State University, Channel Islands; Oke Onwuka; Sequoia Middle School in Newbury Park, California; and Coordinated Robotics.

The CoSTAR team consists of Jet Propulsion Laboratory; California Institute of Technology; MIT; KAIST in South Korea; and Lulea University of Technology in Sweden.

Czech Technical University and Universite Laval constitute the CTU-CRAS-NORLAB team, while the Explorer team is composed of Carnegie Mellon University and Oregon State University.

The MARBLE team includes the University of Colorado in Boulder and Denver, Scientific Systems and the University of California in Santa Cruz.

Robotika International, Robotika.cz, Centre for Field Robotics Czech University of Life Science and the Cogito team in Switzerland constitute the Robotika team.

“Complex underground settings present significant challenges for military and civilian first responders,” said Timothy Chung, a program manager at DARPA’s tactical technology office. “The DARPA SubT Challenge is looking for novel approaches to rapidly map, navigate, and search underground environments during time-sensitive combat operations or disaster response scenarios.”

The teams will compete across Tunnel, Cave and Urban subdomain circuits. First place winners will get a prize of $2 million, second will receive $1 million and third place winners will get $500,000.

DARPA will also hold a virtual competition for the SubT Challenge and will accept entries through June 29 with plans to announce qualifiers by summer.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has begun to assess its efforts to address cyber threats coming from foreign entities potentially involved in supply chain disruption and ransomware cases, CyberScoop reported Friday.

The review, which is set to run for four months, will tackle the ransomware cryptocurrencies employed by enemy nations and criminal organizations. Ransomware uses encryption to block a victim from accessing files unless a demanded amount of money is paid.

Lisa Monaco, the deputy attorney general, said at the Munich Cybersecurity Conference that the government has to work with the private sector and other partners to cope up with challenges brought by malicious actors.

Comtech Telecommunications Corp. (NASDAQ: CMTL), a world leader in secure wireless communications technologies, announced today, that during its third quarter of fiscal 2021, its Government Solutions segment, through its Maryland-based subsidiary, Comtech Mobile Datacom Corporation, was awarded $6.2 million of additional funding for Option Period Four of contract GS03Q17DSC0002. The overall funded value to date, inclusive of the Base and Option Period 1 through Option Period 4, is $35.5 million.

This contract modification is part of the BFT-1 sustainment support contract for the U.S. Army’s Project Manager Mission Command (“PM MC”) Blue Force Tracking (“BFT-1”) program. Comtech continues to perform engineering services, satellite network operations and program management through a Firm Fixed Price (“FFP”) contract, with Time & Materials (“T&M”) and Cost Reimbursement elements. Option Period Four’s performance period began on April 15, 2021 and ends on April 14, 2022.

“We are pleased our U.S. Army continues to recognize the value of Comtech’s services,” said Fred Kornberg, Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of Comtech Telecommunications Corp. “Our team remains committed to providing the U.S. Army and its soldiers with critical BFT-1 sustainment support.”

Comtech Telecommunications Corp. is a leader in the global communications market headquartered in Melville, New York. With a passion for customer success, Comtech designs, produces and markets advanced secure wireless solutions to more than 1,000 customers in more than 100 countries.

The National Security Agency (NSA) has launched a partnership with the National Cryptologic Foundation to encourage the public and private sector to collaborate on cybersecurity and national security. NCF marks its silver founding anniversary in 2021.

The said effort will be made through the agency's external engagement strategy and the foundation's continued initiatives to expand public sector awareness, NSA said Friday.

The agency cited a need to increase cybersecurity awareness across academia, government, private industry and the general public.

The partnership also aims to develop nationwide education programs for boosting talent pipelines in cyber, science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields to meet workforce demands. A platform for facilitating cybersecurity discussions and technical exchanges is also planned to address gaps in the cyber landscape.

In addition, NSA and NCF look to inform the public about the value of cryptology to the U.S. and how it contributed to the protection and preservation of national security and the American culture.

If you're interested in cybersecurity then check out GovCon Wire's Defense Cybersecurity Forum coming up on May 12th. Click here to learn more.

William Nelson, director of the U.S. Army’s assured positioning, navigation and timing cross-functional team, said the branch seeks to accelerate experimentation and prototyping work on space-based sensors using a recently approved capability guide, C4ISRNET reported Saturday.

He noted that the Tactical Space Layer Abbreviated Capability Development Document will serve as a guide in efforts to shape technology requirements and create a path to transition the project to a program of record.

The Army is exploring methods to utilize sensors at different altitudes in a push to reduce the time it takes to gather and transmit satellite data to a weapon system, Nelson added.

The service cleared TSL A-CDD on April 20 to help inform the future application of commercial and government satellites in conjunction with military systems. Army organizations that supported the creation of the document include:

• Long-Range Precision Fires CFT
• Army Space and Missile Defense Command
• Program Executive Office for Intelligence, Electronic Warfare and Sensors
• Project Manager for Positioning, Navigation and Timing
• Intelligence Center of Excellence
• Fires Center of Excellence
• Army G-2