FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
2/28/22
CMI2 welcomes National Guard Soldiers to new center
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (Feb. 28, 2022) – A new facility that will join military and research university resources in cybersecurity preparedness and education will soon open in Morgantown, West Virginia.
The West Virginia Army National Guard’s (WVARNG) Army Interagency Training and Education Center (AITEC) got a look at the future site of the Tactical Operations Related to Cybersecurity Hub or TORCH, earlier this month as part of an innovative information sharing and research development event.
The event focused on developing tactics, techniques, and procedures for network enumeration and hardening for use in upcoming cybersecurity exercise events and real-world incident response and assessment capabilities.
The WVARNG partnered with West Virginia University (WVU) to leverage students’ extensive experience in cybersecurity exercises and education. Participants included students from the John Chambers College of Business and Economics and the Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources. Throughout the three-day event, 20 WVARNG Soldiers and 20 WVU students joined nearly 50 cybersecurity professionals who participated remotely.
“This collaborative effort between WVARNG and WVU to rapidly deploy an offline environment proves that an agile facility such as the TORCH can be a huge asset to soldiers and industry partners alike,” said Jared Lemons, TORCH manager and instructor. “The Soldiers were eager to learn and extremely happy to collaborate and this initial event shows the potential for great things to come. I’m excited to be along for the ride.”
The TORCH is a fully funded, innovative cybersecurity collaboration research and development facility for WVARNG Soldiers to work with professionals from the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (DEVCOM), academic institutions, and industry. This collaboration will develop cybersecurity capabilities specifically related to critical infrastructure protection.
The WVARNG has cybersecurity assessors and incident responders across their force from AITEC’s Critical Infrastructure Protection Battalion (CIP BN) and the Defensive Cyber Operations Element (DCOE).
“This has been a great experience,” said Sgt. 1st Class Jacob Samples, lead cybersecurity operations noncommissioned officer. “We were able to get everyone together safely and share knowledge on prior experiences. You can’t get more hands-on than this.”
The TORCH is the initial Catalyst-Pathfinder Program project with WVARNG and is being executed by CMI2. As part of this congressional initiative, the goal of the program is to harness the creativity and technical skills of academic institutions and help the Army create better solutions to real problems.
In January 2022, CMI2 staff briefed the WVMA and WVARNG leadership on the TORCH concept, and by Feb. 5, Soldiers were able to use the preliminary capabilities of the facility.
DEVCOM and the West Virginia Military Authority (WVMA) fully executed a memorandum of agreement (MOA) in December 2021 to provide the West Virginia Army National Guard opportunities to engage academic institutions and industry partners to solve military technological challenges.
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