{"id":48030,"date":"2025-11-18T22:56:28","date_gmt":"2025-11-18T14:56:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/nro-establishes-space-cyber-program-after-last-months-moonshine-guardian-exercise\/"},"modified":"2025-11-18T22:56:28","modified_gmt":"2025-11-18T14:56:28","slug":"nro-establishes-space-cyber-program-after-last-months-moonshine-guardian-exercise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/nro-establishes-space-cyber-program-after-last-months-moonshine-guardian-exercise\/","title":{"rendered":"NRO Establishes Space Cyber Program After Last Month\u2019s Moonshine Guardian Exercise"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n

RESTON, Virginia <\/em>\u2013 The National Reconnaissance Office<\/strong> (NRO) established a space cyber program to serve as the central hub for space cyber activities across the agency as of Oct. 1, Johnathon Martin, the acting deputy director of the NRO\u2019s Office of the Chief Architect and the incoming deputy director of the NRO Space Cyber Program, announced during the CyberSat conference on Monday.<\/p>\n

Martin also detailed the Moonshine Guardian training exercise last month between the NRO and Space Delta 26.<\/p>\n

While the NRO is no stranger to devising solutions to the decades-old threat of hacking, \u201ctoday\u2019s rapidly evolving threat landscape, combined with our increasingly diverse, complex and interconnected space architecture, demands a more focused approach,\u201d Martin said during CyberSat on Nov. 18. The new space cyber program is built on three pillars.<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst, we\u2019re establishing clear strategic priorities for space security,\u201d Martin said. \u201cSecond, we\u2019re accelerating the integration of cybersecurity capabilities into our space systems. Our team is working directly with program offices to bake cybersecurity and design processes from day one, not as an afterthought. We\u2019re ensuring the bar is high, that programs have what they need to be successful and reach the criteria, and ensuring that they do. We\u2019re doing this while minimizing system complexity and without hindering our acquisition and operational tempo. Third, we\u2019re flattening decision making hierarchies. The NRO chief information security officer has been named the NRO\u2019s space cyber executive.\u201d<\/p>\n

The NRO\u2019s Space Cyber Program will have a direct line to Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA). Its scope will tie together all aspects of space cyber for policy and governance, R&D, engineering, acquisition, and operations, Martin said.<\/p>\n

Former space acquisition chief Frank Calvelli, an NRO veteran, said during the Biden administration that fielding quality ground systems were his top priority, and NRO Director Chris Scolese said in September at the Intelligence and National Security Summit at National Harbor, Maryland, that cyber is his \u201cnumber one concern.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSpace systems are incredibly complex, and the last thing a program manager wants to add is cyber capability that is overly complex,\u201d Martin said on Monday. \u201cSo where should you as a satellite developer or capability provider start? My recommendation is simple. Your own ground station is the greatest threat to your satellite. There are multiple cyber threat vectors to a spacecraft, most of which go through your ground station, and the attack surface of your ground station is significantly greater than the spacecraft itself\u2026How do you teach your satellite to protect itself from you or from your own ground station? The bad guys don\u2019t need some exquisite capability to try to get access to your system when they can pitch a free ride through your ground station. From what I\u2019ve seen, a lot of satellites are sitting ducks in this way. If someone owns the ground station, they own the satellite.\u201d<\/p>\n

Satellites \u201cmust have onboard detection and response and recovery capabilities\u201d to cyber attacks, Martin said.<\/p>\n

Last month, the NRO and Space Delta 26 held the Moonshine Guardian training exercise, featuring defensive cyber measures against attacks on U.S. space systems. U.S. Space Force has held its own Moonlight Defender series of cyber exercises that have used Aerospace Corp.\u2019s \u201cMoonlighter\u201d 3U cube satellite.<\/p>\n

Moonshine Guardian \u201cwas some world class training that we gave some of our operators,\u201d Martin said in a brief interview on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

In his CyberSat address on Monday, Martin said that most space systems use encryption.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we finally checked that box,\u201d he said. \u201cBut let me ask what other capabilities are commonplace now for a given system\u2026How many have space based intrusion detection systems or even ground based intrusion detection systems? How many have intrusion prevention systems that are integrated into the satellite fault management system? How many satellites run everything as root? How many satellites employ multi factor authentication? After all, we\u2019ve had at least 50 years to work on this. So it\u2019s concerning that these types of capabilities and security designs aren\u2019t implemented by default across the board.\u201d<\/p>\n

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