A distinguished delegation of U.S. federal cyber policy makers and experts took a detour from the CyberTech conference in Tel Aviv to the southern Israeli town of Kiryat Gat to hear about the BIRD-managed U.S.-Israel Energy Center's Cyber Consortium - a unique collaboration between U.S. and Israeli cyber academic and industry leaders with a focus on protecting energy facilities from cyber threats.
Hosted by Israeli consortium member Meptagon at their Kiryat Gat site, the delegation consisted of eight representatives from the Office of Management and Budget, Office of National Cyber Director, and the Department of Energy, including the Federal Chief Information Security Officer, the DOE Chief Information Officer, and the DOE Director for Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response (CESER).
The Cyber Consortium - the Israel-U.S. Initiative on Cybersecurity Research and Development for Energy (ICRDE) - is one of four consortia jointly initiated by the U.S. Department of Energy, the Israel Ministry of Energy and the Israel Innovation Authority, to accelerate development and deployment of critical and innovative technologies in the energy sector, and is led by Prof. Rami Puzis from Ben Gurion University of the Negev and Prof. Yang Weng from Arizona State University.
The delegation had the opportunity to see the ICRDE IT/OT Security Demonstrator developed by Meptagon in cooperation with fellow Israeli consortium members SIGA, Otorio, and RAD Data Communications. This demonstrator is designed to showcase the features of security products developed by the consortium partners and to gather data for the development and testing of advanced AI technology. It is the first of several solutions aimed at providing comprehensive IT/OT security for the energy industry, and is a joint effort by members of the ICRDE consortium.
Thanks to Prof. Puzis , Mr. Haim Beltran and Ms. Arela Koter from Meptagon who coordinated the event and to the participating Israeli consortium members who explained their respective roles and contributions to the dynamic binational collaboration.
The Consortium is also grateful to Mr. Shlomi Kofman for his participating in the event and wish him success in his new role as Vice President of the International Division at the Israel Innovation Authority.
 |
 |
 |