Negotiating the cyber battlefield Published Jan. 20, 2010 By 2nd Lt. Jerad Sayler 21st Communications Squadron PETERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Colo. -- Almost a year has passed since Gen. C. Robert Kehler, Air Force Space Command commander, directed the creation and execution of a Cyberspace Awareness Day. The objectives completed during that event helped solidify the importance of having a cyber-sentry ethos command-wide. The 2009 Cyberspace Awareness Day, within the 21st Space Wing, consisted of a phishing exercise, network outage, and wing "All-Call." To continue cultivating the Net Defender mindset, AFSPC is carrying out a series of wing-coordinated network activities. These activities began this month and will continue through March. Social engineering is the broad term for manipulating people to give sensitive information through trickery and fraud, and is most commonly associated with the use of a computer. Phishing is the technique of pretending to be a trusted sender to gather personal information from victims. Spear phishing targets a specific organization by tailoring its messages to gain unauthorized organizational access and information. Many methods can be used with great success and can cause harm to Air Force personnel. We see examples of the threats affecting the cyber domain daily as potent adversaries overcome network security complacency. We see drone camera feeds that have been compromised and terabytes of fighter jet data that have been stolen. The harsher reality is that modern day battles are also fought on personal computers and cell phones. Social networking sites are easy targets to compromise users' accounts and spread spam and viruses. The ready and easy use of technology, combined with constant twittering and personal Web page updates, has made it relatively easy for hackers to gather critical information and compromise the Air Force mission. It is vitally important that we maintain vigilance on the Air Force network and our personal networks. This is the focus of the 2010 Cyberspace Awareness Program. As General Kehler said, "Every time we place our common access card into our computers, we are entering a battlefield." With this in mind, let's all do our part to fly, fight and win in cyberspace.