DSTO - Defence Science & Technology Organisation
DSTO - Defence Science & Technology Organisation
07/17/2024 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 07/16/2024 16:24
Locking horns with hackers during NATO Exercise Locked Shields
A DSTG team of cyber professionals including several new graduates were part of an Australian team which recently battled the world's toughest hackers in a bid to defend the fictional country of Berylia.
The after-hours experience was a 'dry run' that helped NATO's Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (CCDCOE) prepare for this year's annual Exercise Locked Shields. Hosted in Estonia, Locked Shields is hailed as the world's most advanced live-fire cyber defence exercise, showcasing strategic collaboration across more than 40 nations.
Nick, who started his Defence science career as a DSTG STEM cadet while studying computer science and mechatronics engineering, is now a DSTG embedded systems engineer. He says the important role played by partner countries during this dry run is to be guinea pigs, testing the Locked Shields hardware and software in advance of the main event. Importantly, it also gives prospective cyber-defenders valuable live-fire experience.
DSTG graduate engineer Bradyn says team members got a good intro to cyber defence, including broad exposure to elements beyond the securing of networks. 'A big benefit for me was getting an appreciation of how to do cyber at scale,' he says. 'Locked Shields features a massive network of people and we obviously needed some sort of hierarchical command and control to achieve what we wanted to achieve.'
The Australian team's fifty-strong posse of cyber professionals and undergraduates gathered in rooms at the Cyber Range at Lot 14 in Adelaide. Over a couple of intense evenings they defended simulated national IT systems and critical infrastructure against some of the world's best hackers.
'I was actually surprised at the mix of people in the group,' says Nick. 'A fairly sizeable DSTG representation alongside Adelaide University and some UNSW Sydney and Canberra (ADFA) students, with a range of experience from early career people like myself, all the way up.'
'Over two nights (the time difference with Estonia meant we worked from 5pm till 3am) our team's role was essentially cyber response - hardening and defending the digital systems of the fictional country of Berylia against cyber threats from neighbouring Crimsonia. After being dropped into an unknown IT system, our job was to essentially lock it down and then defend it against cyber-adversaries.'
Pressure brings out the best
With the world's best hackers knocking on their virtual country's door, Bradyn and Nick and co found it stressful, particularly when they couldn't work out how hackers were gaining access.
'I think the good thing was, there were so many attacks coming from everywhere that we knew that we wouldn't be able to defend them all,' admits Bradyn. 'We had figured out beforehand what the priorities would be. I suspect that participation in an event like this does encourage people to consider careers in this area. Once one realises just how easy it is to actually do some of those destructive attacks, it raises the importance of cyber preparedness. A lot of Locked Shields teams lost their power grids, and in a real conflict it is potentially quite hard to recover from impacts like that.'
Bradyn was supported for two of his undergraduate years as a DSTG STEM cadet. He is now enjoying a career at DSTG in the cyber realm. He definitely recommends the Locked Shields experience to others, even those outside of the cyber realm because there are also roles available in legal and strategic communications. 'If you're a lawyer and wanting to learn more about international law and conflict, or if you're in a public relations or communications role you get experience conducting media interviews and writing up briefs.'
'A big thanks to the Australian Cyber Collaboration Centre (Aus3C) team for organising the venue and feeding us and the week-long training and preparation boot camp, including bringing out organisers from the NATO CCDCOE in Estonia to explain aspects of the event. And hats off to the Red Team hackers for being very good at what they do and for giving us a hard challenge.'
The Australian team ended the partner run ranked third overall, ranking highest on the purely cyber technical aspects.
Find out more about Locked Shields here.
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