Photo By Sgt. 1st Class Robert Jordan | North Carolina National Guard leadership invites hazard mitigation, cyber, and...... read more read more
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Leaders of the North Carolina National Guard invited hazard mitigation, cyber, and information technology experts for a five-day exercise, Operation Tobacco Road, held at NCNG Joint Force Headquarters and North Carolina Emergency Management in Raleigh, North Carolina, July 21-25, 2025.
The technical cybersecurity exercise invited over 140 local, state, and national government and corporate partner experts to identify and respond to cyber threat actors in a real-time environment reflecting real-world cybersecurity threats.
“It is pretty important for us,” U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Allen Boyette, the NCNG Deputy Adjutant General, said.
The teams' goal was sharing common cyber defense tools and gaining valuable experience in network security and intrusion analysis.
“They need to know why it (cyber training) matters (and) take the lessons learned back,” Erik A. Hooks, a former North Carolina Department of Public Safety Secretary, FEMA Deputy Administrator, and career public safety professional and consultant, said.
The members were assigned to five different defensive cyber operator teams who were defending a fictional North Carolina local government from an NCNG opposing force trying to exploit any weakness in the various scenarios.
Other professionals of the assessment team monitored the progress of the cyber operators and provided their expertise to help train them.
“North Carolina has one of the most Mature models and emulates Cyber Shield (a long-running United States Department of Defense international cyber exercise),” Chief Information Security Officer, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University Eric Zach said.
The days of online interaction, simulated cyber intrusions, in in-person tabletop exercises tested skills and training. Members identified network vulnerabilities, including hacking, ransomware, and unauthorized network access.
“What can we (learn to) do better,” U.S. Army Lt. Col Seth Barun, NCNG Chief of Cyber Operations, said.
With this much talent under one roof attracts attention at the highest level. Visitors from public and private cybersecurity institutions toured the exercise July 24.
“I love it (OTC) it will strengthen North Carolina cybersecurity,” Secretary and State Chief Information Officer of the North Carolina Department of Information Technology Teena Piccione said.
Leaders guided their guests to the North Carolina Department of Emergency Management offices at JFHQ used for the exercise.
“It is a challenging environment,” NCDIT Chief Information Security Officer Bernice Russell-Bond said.
When you bring the Senior Director, Information Security and Chief Information Security Officer of the world's largest privately held software company into a warren of so many cyber experts with decades of experience, you get very expected benefits.
“We are here to partner; they build skills here, we hired someone from (a previous) OTC, and he brought a lot of skills to us,” Senior Director, Information Security and Chief Information Security Officer, SAS Institute Inc. Brian Wilson said.
The NCNG’s Cyber Security Response Force hosts OTR twice a year. For more information https://www.csrf.nc.gov/operation-tobacco-road.
The CSRF mission is to conduct defensive cyberspace operations to support mission requirements as directed by the NCNG’s Adjutant General or Governor.
Their duties include cyber incident response, digital forensics, cyber hygiene assessment, penetration testing, training, and outreach.
| Date Taken: | 08.08.2025 |
| Date Posted: | 08.08.2025 16:01 |
| Story ID: | 545228 |
| Location: | RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA, US |
| Web Views: | 95 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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