The Space Information Sharing and Analysis Center (ISAC) and the National Cybersecurity Center (NCC) have announced that the University of Colorado Colorado Springs (UCCS) has joined the Space ISAC as a founding member — Gretchen Bliss, the Director of UCCS Cybersecurity Programs, will sit on the Space ISAC Board.
UCCS and the NCC, which serves as the operational arm of the Space ISAC, have been partners since the NCC’s founding. Now, as UCCS becomes a Space ISAC founding board member, that partnership extends to the Space ISAC and enhances the ISAC’s access to Colorado’s space and cybersecurity ecosystems and one of Colorado’s higher education institutions developing cybersecurity engineers.
Bliss said that UCCS is uniquely positioned to provide the cybersecurity workforce and research that industry and government are looking for with the headquarters of the Space ISAC, National Cybersecurity Center and Exponential Impact located in the organization's Cybersecurity Building. Students and faculty will be able to collaborate with the leading organizations, government, academia and industry in the space and cybersecurity fields on education, training and research to provide timely, effective solutions to hard problems at the national level.
Frank Backes, Chairman of the Space ISAC Board and Senior Vice President of Kratos Federal Space, added that UCCS has been a thought leader in the Colorado Springs space and cybersecurity communities. The Space ISAC board is made up of organizations that are committed to the security of the global space critical infrastructure. UCCS shares that same passion and has backed that passion up with significant cybersecurity community investments of resources, facilities, and expertise.
Erin Miller, VP of Operations for Space ISAC, at the National Cybersecurity Center, added that with their cybersecurity program spanning across the College of Engineering, College of Business, and College of Public Affairs, UCCS is bringing a focus on cybersecurity specific to space unlike any other university. With the university’s proximity and close ties to both the U.S. Space Force and U.S. Space Command, their partnership will help the Space ISAC and our future growth of training programs reach untapped potential.
The Space ISAC is the only space-dedicated ISAC and is made possible through the investment by its board and founding members. Its board, which held its third meeting in March, is comprised of leaders in the space industry, cybersecurity sectors, academia, and FFRDCs, and includes Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc. (NASDAQ: KTOS), Booz Allen Hamilton (NYSE: BAH), MITRE, SES, Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT), Northrop Grumman (NYSE: NOC), Parsons Corporation (NYSE: PSN), Purdue University, the Space Dynamics Laboratory, the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, the Aerospace Corporation, and the University of Colorado Colorado Springs.
Each board member has a role in fulfilling the mission of the ISAC: to facilitate collaboration across the global space industry to enhance our ability to prepare for and respond to vulnerabilities, incidents, and threats; to disseminate timely and actionable information among member entities; and to serve as the primary communications channel for the sector with respect to this information.
