Cyber situation awareness as distributed socio-cognitive work

Michael Tyworth; Nicklaus A. Giacobe; Vincent Mancuso

doi:10.1117/12.919338

7 May 2012 Cyber situation awareness as distributed socio-cognitive work

Michael Tyworth, Nicklaus A. Giacobe, Vincent Mancuso

Proceedings Volume 8408, Cyber Sensing 2012; 84080F (2012) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.919338
Event: SPIE Defense, Security, and Sensing, 2012, Baltimore, Maryland, United States

Abstract

A key challenge for human cybersecurity operators is to develop an understanding of what is happening within, and to, their network. This understanding, or situation awareness, provides the cognitive basis for human operators to take action within their environments. Yet developing situation awareness of cyberspace (cyber-SA) is understood to be extremely difficult given the scope of the operating environment, the highly dynamic nature of the environment and the absence of physical constraints that serve to bound the cognitive task23. As a result, human cybersecurity operators are often "flying blind" regarding understanding the source, nature, and likely impact of malicious activity on their networked assets. In recent years, many scholars have dedicated their attention to finding ways to improve cyber-SA in human operators. In this paper we present our findings from our ongoing research of how cybersecurity analysts develop and maintain cyber-SA. Drawing from over twenty interviews of analysts working in the military, government, industrial, and educational domains, we find that cyber-SA to be distributed across human operators and technological artifacts operating in different functional areas.

Citation Download Citation

Michael Tyworth, Nicklaus A. Giacobe, and Vincent Mancuso "Cyber situation awareness as distributed socio-cognitive work", Proc. SPIE 8408, Cyber Sensing 2012, 84080F (7 May 2012); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.919338

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