MITRE Honored as Organization of the Year for Information Security Contributions

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

BEDFORD, Mass., and MCLEAN, Va., April 30, 2009 — The MITRE Corporation is pleased to announce it has been named the 2008 Organization of the Year by the Information Systems Security Association (ISSA). The largest international, not-for-profit association for information security professionals and practitioners, ISSA promotes management practices that ensure the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of information resources.

MITRE was nominated by the ISSA Northern Virginia Chapter for its role as a long-time supporter of the association and the information security profession, and for the development of publicly available solutions to thwart cybercrime such as its "honeyclient" open-source package that proactively monitors Internet servers for fast-running, malicious programs designed to infect user systems.

ISSA International president Howard Schmidt presented the award at a ceremony held during the RSA Conference in San Francisco on April 22 to Robert Nesbit, senior vice president and general manager of MITRE's Center for Integrated Intelligence Systems.

In learning of the award, MITRE president and chief executive officer Al Grasso commented, "We see it as part of our public service mission to support the information security profession, including sharing knowledge we've developed to safeguard data and protect it from misuse. Recognition by ISSA tells us we’re meeting this critical responsibility."

In the past decade, MITRE has developed four of the six security standards which comprise the National Institute of Standards and Technology's Security Content Automation Protocol, or SCAP. The four standards—Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE®); Open Vulnerability and Assessment Language (OVAL®); Common Platform Enumeration (CPE™); and Common Configuration Enumeration (CCE™)—together form a larger program known collectively as "Making Security Measurable." The CVE initiative is a list of more than 20,000 names industry experts have agreed to use in identifying vulnerabilities. The OVAL project offers baseline standards that help determine the presence of vulnerabilities and configuration issues on computer systems. MITRE recently started offering a free one-day course, which includes instruction in OVAL and other information assurance tools and standards.

About The MITRE Corporation

The MITRE Corporation (www.mitre.org) is a not-for-profit organization that provides systems engineering, research and development, and information technology support to the government. It operates federally funded research and development centers for the Department of Defense, the Federal Aviation Administration, the Internal Revenue Service and Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Department of Homeland Security, with principal locations in Bedford, Mass., and McLean, Va.

MITRE’s Cybersecurity Mission Area partners with government and industry on a wide variety of cybersecurity, information assurance, and information sharing efforts. Activities in this area include helping government sponsors to enumerate baseline security data, providing standardized languages for accurately communicating data security information, and encouraging knowledge sharing with users by developing repositories. For more information, visit http://www.mitre.org/work/cybersecurity.html.

About ISSA

ISSA is celebrating its 25th year as the largest international professional association for information security professionals. With 10,000 members in 70 countries and a network of 140 chapters, ISSA is dedicated to expanding the knowledge and expertise of information security professionals and the development and evolution of industry practices. Members are consistently recognized as experts on critical issues in the field and are seen as important resources for small businesses, global enterprises, and government organizations. For more information, visit http://www.issa.org.

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