A Cybersecurity Call to Arms

The Air Force is establishing a Chief Information Security Office and kicking off a year-long “Cyber Secure” campaign to coincide with National Cybersecurity Awareness Month, the service announced Monday. Chief Information Officer Lt. Gen. Bill Bender announced the moves in a Sept. 23 memorandum. “Cybersecurity depends on every airman regardless of rank or job description,” Bender wrote. “Every time you log onto a system, click on a link, download a file, or plug one device into another, we risk exposing our systems to exploitation.” The memo provides little detail on the role of the CISO, but Bender noted industry has used the approach and that “it is time we had an enterprise strategy to protect and operate in cyberspace.” In a video announcing the Cyber Secure campaign, Bender said he was issuing a call to arms for airmen to take cybersecurity seriously. “We must begin to change our culture today,” he said. In July, Bender told reporters his office was rolling out the service-wide cyber hygiene and acculturation plan to mitigate the self-induced cyber threat. He noted bad cyber hygiene amounts to about 80 percent of the cyber threat to the service. (See also: The Real Cyber Threat.)