On December 17, SpiderOak announced that the Space Development Agency (SDA) has awarded additional funding to its Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract, to demonstrate the integration of USSF identity and access management (IDAM) software with the SpiderOak’s Platform protecting space systems.
The contract extension reflects the importance of securing ground and space interactions by applying zero trust concepts across the entire architecture. With SpiderOak, SDA can address the unique cybersecurity challenges of the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA), a highly distributed, commercial and defense mesh network of ground and spaced based assets in low earth orbit. The work builds on SpiderOak’s success in demonstrating topic-level micro segmentation, enabling the application of zero-trust principles to prevent unauthorized access to data and resources.
“SpiderOak is excited to continue this collaboration with SDA to advance cyber resilience for space operations,” said Matthew Erickson, vice president of solutions at SpiderOak. “The extension allows us to further demonstrate our technology by integrating seamlessly with existing Space Force Identity and Access Management systems, reducing operational costs while strengthening overall mission resilience.”
By addressing vulnerabilities such as malware spread across flattened network architectures, SpiderOak’s security capabilities will ensure continued operation of PWSA systems even in the event of a network compromise. With SpiderOak embedded, every interaction within a network is guaranteed to be authenticated, authorized, and encrypted regardless of network security controls deployed as part of the PWSA architecture or at the tactical edge. In the event of a network breach unauthorized endpoint access, spoofing, and data theft can be prevented limiting the impact.
“Our collaboration with SDA and SSC underscores the urgent need to address the evolving threat landscape with advanced zero-trust architectures,” said Charles Beames, executive chairman of SpiderOak. “Innovations such as the SpiderOak Platform are pivotal to ensuring the resilience and operational security of space systems as they become increasingly critical to national security and global stability.”
SDA’s PWSA network is designed to serve as a unified network across ground and space segments. SpiderOak zero-trust protections will ensure this architecture can maintain secure operations while simplifying the integration process for preexisting Space Force systems, enhancing overall mission success.
Source: SpiderOak
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