We continue our effort to underscore certain patterns and themes found throughout the OODAcast library of over 80 conversations with leaders and decision-makers.

In December 2020, OODA CEO Matt Devost had a conversation with Masha Sedova, an award-winning people-security expert, speaker, and entrepreneur focused on helping companies transform employees from a risk into a key element of defense.  She has been a part of our OODA Network for years, including speaking at our legacy FedCyber event, where she introduced the behavior-based and gamified cybersecurity training and awareness she put in place at Salesforce. 

In May 2021, OODA CTO had a conversation with Bryson Bort, the Founder of SCYTHE, a start-up building a next-generation attack emulation platform, and GRIMM, a boutique cybersecurity consultancy. He is widely known in the cybersecurity community for helping advance concepts of defense across multiple critical domains. He is the co-founder of the ICS Village, a non-profit advancing awareness of industrial control system security.

On all accounts, it appears that the U.S. government is making a real effort to maintain its advantage in cyberspace.  Hunt forward operations have been an innovative practice that has the potential to reduce the adversary footprint in cyberspace by merging international cooperation with the ability to proactively locate and counter adversaries in the regions in which they operate.  Based on these actions, it is evident that hunt operations are consistent with the strategic blueprint DoD has laid out for itself indicating that any progress will be built upon and applied across a wide range of state and nonstate adversarial groups. If these successes continue, the United States may have found a strategy that is more than just words that communicate a message. They will demonstrate that the government is practicing what it is preaching.

In the OODA Almanac 2022, OODA CEO Matt Devost provided our initial position for the exploration of “Autonomous Everything” throughout the 2022 calendar year of OODA Loop research and analysis: “Every year more robots enter our businesses and private lives. Emerging examples include Tesla’s Full Self Driving (FSD) capability (which leverages advanced computer vision, machine learning, neural networks, and control of a self-contained electric vehicle) or the humanoid robot called digit from Agility Robotics (that is designed to work with humans in a factory or retail environment). AI and machine learning will automate data analytics and improve IT-based workflows – and we expect improved support for automated workflows by complex physical and tech systems.” This post expands on this initial position and our ongoing research on the future of autonomous systems.

Reshoring is the transfer of business operations back to its country of origin. The term is usually associated with manufacturing but it applies to any business operation. The trend of reshoring back to the US from China began about a decade ago when some businesses realized costs in China (including labor and compliance and also transportation) were rising. Meanwhile automation was changing the cost equation for some business operations, making reshoring decisions easier. Over the last decade, tarrifs due to unfair practices and persecution of ethnic minorities added new motivation to reshore. The pandemic and China’s zero covid policy and resulting shutdowns of industry and transportation in China has now build an even stronger motivation to reshore, and the war in Ukraine has proven to any doubters the importance of having supply chains free of influence of totolitarian nations. The trend of reshoring will clearly accelerate.

We have another crucial update on what has been characterized as “the greatest cryptographic migration in history.” National Security Memorandum (NSM) 8, “Improving the Cybersecurity of National Security, Department of Defense and Intelligence Community Systems” was released in January, and was followed up by the Quantum Cybersecurity Preparedness Act.  We provided an initial analysis of NSM8, followed by a breakdown and analysis on April 29th of NSM8 and the Quantum Cybersecurity Preparedness Act. Days after our analysis in April, our core research question regarding a more formal role for the private sector in this migration was answered by the release on May 4th of National Security Memorandum (NSM) 10.