Arlington, VA May 28, 2008 -- The National Security Agency continues its rollout of the new DoD security strategy, Enterprise Security Management, at the second AFEI Enterprise Security Management conference in June (http://www.afei.org/brochure/8a02). "This conference will continue and focus the exchange of community perspectives which began at the September 2007 ESM Fall Festival to increase understanding and awareness of ESM across both the public and private sectors by engaging government, industry and allies" said Marcia Weaver, Chief of the Enterprise Security Management System Program Office at NSA.

"The threat is real" said Dave Wennergren, Deputy Chief Information Officer of the Defense Department at the September event. "The nature of the world has changed; it's now about the net -- the survivability, sustainability and resilience of the network. It is fundamentally changing how people think about addressing the threat."

The threat is both real and prevalent. The TimesNow Morning Show in India broadcast on Thursday, May 22 reported on the Indian government accusing China of daily attacks on networks and websites, including their National Informatics Center. Last May the BBC reported that Estonia, one of the most internet-savvy states in the European Union, was under sustained denial-of-service attacks that were rumored to have come from Russia. Last January DoD experienced a cyber-attack that took an e-mail system off-line. Defense Secretary Gates said the Pentagon is exposed to "perhaps hundreds of attacks a day."

The Department of Defense is highly dependent on networks and digital information to conduct the vast majority of its routine business and warfighting missions. In the past security solutions have been added to information systems after they were built and deployed. This approach will not provide the information assurance ans superiority necessary in today's threat environment.

"Enterprise Security Management provides the foundation to make information superiority a reality" said Ms Weaver. "This is critical to our mission success and provides information to those who need it, when and where it is needed, while denying it from our adversaries" she said.

The conference focuses on managing enterprise Information Assurance (IA) processes, services, and assets within new global operating paradigms, acutely shortened decision cycles, evolving information-age environments, and with the same underlying drivers across the public and private sectors. Industry and Government are seeking the same new technologies, practices, and approaches to policies that will institutionalize enterprise-wide security.

"Business leaders concerned about protecting networks and data, detecting and defeating cyber attacks, ensuring the security of enterprise information, and understanding the emerging principles of unified information assurance across their enterprise should be attending this conference" said Dave Chesebrough, President of AFEI. "We must be prepared to deter, prevent and defeat cyber attacks that could cripple our infrastructure and cause economic disruption."

About AFEI:
AFEI is an industry association dedicated to the advancement of the sharing, integration, management and protection of information across extended enterprises (people, process and technology), with a focus on national security and defense issues. AFEI (www.afei.org) is an affiliate subsidiary of the National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA) (www.ndia.org), America's leading industry association promoting national security.

Contact:
Press inquiries should be directed to Betsy Lauer, Director of Business development, AFEI
703.247.9473
www.afei.com