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Celebrating Cyber Warriors

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Dana S. Deasy, the Defense Department’s chief information officer, described the performance of the DOD CIO cyber and information technology award winners as outstanding and marked by major accomplishments during an awards ceremony at the Pentagon.

Deasy stood in for Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick M. Shanahan as host of the event when Shanahan was called away.

What you should know about the awards:

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Deasy said Shanahan passed along some words to him for the award recipients, noting, “The people in this room safeguard the most-important secrets, maintain our infrastructure, create defensive and offensive tools to protect our nation, and navigate in an unknown domain … ”
A woman holds a framed award certificate.
Cyberthreat Analyst
Mariah Miller-Gordon, a U.S. Strategic Command cyberthreat analyst based in Omaha, Neb., holds the individual award she received at the 2018 Defense Department Chief Information Officer Cyber and Information Technology Excellence annual award ceremony at the Pentagon, Nov. 29, 2018. Miller-Gordon was recognized for her work developing a matrix aimed at identifying insider threats.
Photo By: Terri Moon Cronk
VIRIN: 181129-D-DE571-001
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Shanahan also said the award recipients have “an incredibly profound impact on DOD. Congratulations to all winners. The work you’re doing is vital to a successful mission for our warfighters.”
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The team and individual winners encompassed a variety of accomplishments, such as establishing the first-ever Air Force closed space network architecture, developing solutions that help things such as military pay, and enhancing and protecting personal identifiable information.
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There were 100 nominations this year for the team and individual awards.
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The CIO said four priorities carry “an incredible focus from a technology standpoint:” The DOD cloud, artificial intelligence, cyber and [C3, also known as command, control and communications]. “And we have something overarching called reform to simplify the way we get stuff done. Every one of these [awards] fits into one of those priorities,” Deasy said. “We can’t get these things done without great people,” he said. 

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