National Institute of Standards and Technology officially opened the National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence last week.
The center, a new public-private collaboration, will bring together experts from industry, government and academia to design, implement, test and demonstrate integrated cybersecurity solutions and promote their widespread adoption.
“The NCCoE will provide a state-of-the-art computing facility where researchers from NIST can work collaboratively with both the users and vendors of products and services on holistic cybersecurity approaches,” said NIST Chief of the Computer Security Division and acting director of the center Donna Dodson. “By providing a test bed where new ideas and technologies can be tried out before being deployed, the center provides the opportunity to thoroughly document and share each solution, supporting specific industry sector business challenges. This will encourage the rapid adoption of comprehensive cybersecurity templates and approaches that support automated and trustworthy e-government and e-commerce.”
The center has three goals:
- enhance trust in U.S. IT communications, data and storage systems;
- lower risk for companies and individuals using IT systems;
- encourage development of innovative, job-creating cybersecurity products and services
The center’s work will be pursued through public-private sector teams organized around “use cases.” Team members will work together to identify objectives and create opportunities for collaborative leadership among technology and business communities.
The first test case will be centered on health information technology and future use cases will be selected and refined through workshops and input from broad groups of stakeholders, as well as public feedback. Applicable standards and guidelines will be identified and interested IT vendors involved through open calls for participation.
