As a trusted space partner to the U.S. government, Booz Allen helps clients modernize capabilities for today’s greatest space challenges:
The U.S. government has identified some of the most critical threats to space systems:
Space Policy Directive-5 mandates cyber protections for space systems, supporting the national security goal of maintaining U.S. leadership and freedom of action in space.
Operational Technology Meets IT
The White House’s executive order on improving cybersecurity for IT and operational technology (OT) underscores a critical aspect of space systems: They’re a hybrid of IT and OT.
“These systems are at the intersection of the cyber and physical worlds,” says Allison Mitrovich, Booz Allen chief engineer. “You must protect the threat surface of the physical systems as well as their network connections.”
“For space cyber defense, you need to understand the mission, the ecosystem, and what threats make this environment different—whether in the systems themselves or the processes used to manage those systems,” says Steve Bolish, who leads cybersecurity teams supporting clients including the U.S. Space Force. For example:
> Mission—Ensure precision. Many defense and intelligence space missions revolve around gathering information using geographical coordinates. Therefore, location matters.
> Ecosystem—Understand each layer. These operational technology systems include satellites, ground systems, control centers, and connected devices. “You need to check every connection from the ground station to the space layer,” says Allison.
> Threats—Look from the ground up. Ground systems are the easiest for an adversary to attack—for example, jamming (OT attack) or pinging an uplink antenna (IT attack). Unencrypted public signals like GPS are especially vulnerable.
> Outsource with caution. Although cloud providers work to scale security, system owners must still address the diverse vulnerabilities of every system layer, from access controls to satellite downlinks.
> Plan for breach. “You want to design not just for functionality, but resiliency—and that means redundancy,” Allison says. System designers should include elements like:
Advanced protection strategies begin with open frameworks, the foundation of flexible systems.
Open Systems Architecture
Migrating to open systems architecture provides an entry point for next-generation engineering at the intersection of cybersecurity and space security. Through open standards and reusable components, open frameworks allow organizations to:
IT/OT Best Practices
As a blend of IT and OT, space systems need cyber protections similar to that of industrial control systems and other operational technology—for example, automated processes. They need safeguards mandated for all government IT systems, such as:
To thwart adversaries in the high-stakes domain of space, cyber specialists must go beyond general principles to mitigate the vulnerabilities of that specific system.
The next generation of space systems needs to be developed with cybersecurity in mind from Day One. That’s where model-based systems engineering (MBSE) comes in. MBSE includes customized specialties such as reverse engineering and digital twins.
Reverse Engineering: Discover Vulnerabilities
“For years, we’ve been reverse-engineering legacy systems—for example, launch systems from 40 years ago that never had an as-built [contractor drawing submitted at project completion],” says Steve Bolish, a cyber director in our Colorado Springs office.
“We decompose a system into its parts so the military has an understanding of how to modernize it. And it allows us to identify built-in vulnerabilities so they can mitigate them—and replace legacy systems with modern, secure, sustainable architectures.”
Digital Twins: Prepare for the Unknown
“We can build a digital twin of the whole system rapidly—ground control, uplink, and space vehicle,” Allison says. “With digital twins, you can learn to manage in the unknown.”
Once the virtual model is built, cyber specialists conduct vulnerability scans and penetration tests. They can then:
Our teams maintain a custom threat hunt library which we leverage along with client data to supply a continually updated reference. This allows cyber specialists to build a picture of what’s normal, identify anomalies, and continually refine the system’s threat posture.
Space cybersecurity can be mapped to the NIST framework for managing cyber risk. Digital twins can be used in all five functions, regardless of the organization’s cyber maturity level. Here are a few examples:
As adversaries develop new methods of attack, we invent new ways to protect. Here are some concepts we’re taking to cyber’s leading edge.
Space Cyber Test Range
Our PNT teams are working to create a simulated ecosystem depicting space assets in orbit. A digital twin can then be linked to a that system’s physical ground station and operations center or digital representations of those elements. This will accelerate threat detection and mitigation across the system lifecycle.
AI at the Edge
Advances in analytics and cloud capabilities enable AI to play an increasing role.
For example, “Ground stations can be upgraded to act as a smart sensor, ingesting and analyzing data as it streams in rather than sending low-level metrics to a data lake,” Steve says.
Smart systems will advance the mission as well as protect it. “With AI at the point of the sensor, you can know you’re getting a valid signal. That would allow decisions to be made at the speed of the data—a major goal for JADC2,” he points out.
Integrating Systems Engineering, Cyber, and MBSE
“Traditional systems engineers envision separate tracks for systems engineering, MBSE, and cybersecurity. We integrate it all,” Steve says.
“Clients get an ‘aha!’ moment when we point out that the same documents can be used for all three tracks.” Conducting the activities concurrently delivers advantages such as:
“Creating a parallel path for systems integration, cyber, and MBSE truly gives the client a build that’s faster, cheaper, and better,” Steve says.
When clients engage us to secure space systems, they know they’ll receive state-of-the-art cybersecurity from a leader in the field. Here’s a snapshot of what we provide:
Intelligence and Defense Understanding
Digital Engineering and Agile Development
