{"id":482748,"date":"2025-06-16T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-06-16T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=482748"},"modified":"2025-06-17T07:16:57","modified_gmt":"2025-06-17T07:16:57","slug":"national-guard-state-partnership-collaboration-at-cyber-shield-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=482748","title":{"rendered":"National Guard, State Partnership Collaboration at Cyber Shield 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n Minnesota National Guardsmen and Norwegian officers work together during the annual Cyber Shield training event held at the Virginia National Guard\u2019s State Military Reservation in Virginia Beach, 30 May – 13 June, 2025. Cyber Shield is the longest-running and largest Department of Defense cyber exercise, comprising nearly 900 National Guard and Army Reserve Soldiers, Airmen, civilian cyber professionals, and international partners from around the globe.
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VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. \u2013 Once a year, the National Guard invites cybersecurity professionals worldwide to attend a cumulative event known as Cyber Shield, where they can compete, learn and challenge their skill sets.<\/p>\n

Cyber Shield is the longest-running and largest Department of Defense cyber exercise. For this year\u2019s exercise, the Department of Defense National Guard Bureau\u2019s State Partnership Program (SPP) welcomed 15 countries to work alongside 38 U.S. states and territories.<\/p>\n

Cyber Shield 2025 hosted a variety of competitions, brain teasers, informative classes and realistic exercises that allowed cyber professionals from around the globe to expand their knowledge and share their expertise.<\/p>\n

Norway, one of the newest countries to join the SPP, attended this year. Despite its fresh partnership with Minnesota, Norway quickly became a trailblazer and crushed the cyber competition.<\/p>\n

Norway was among the various international teams that raced to decode its way to the finish line in the annual capture the flag event. During the game, there was a pinnacle moment when the Norway team members realized their coding expertise had led them to uncover physical grid coordinates. With Brazil hot on their heels, the Norway team members secured the victory by locating and capturing an American flag.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think this is a very good arena to gamify cybersecurity expertise,\u201d said Norway Chief Petty Officer Simen Voll, assigned to Norway\u2019s Security Operations Center.<\/p>\n

In addition to these coding competitions, participants received real-world training and exercises to prepare them for addressing real-world cyber threats.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn this world, there are advanced persistent threats,\u201d said Poland 2nd Lt. Pawel Borowski, assigned to the Poland Cyber Detachment. \u201cSo, the key here is sharing knowledge between each other so that we will be better prepared for our adversaries.\u201d<\/p>\n

Because of the global and detrimental nature that cyber threats have posed in today\u2019s world, international collaboration has become more pertinent than ever.<\/p>\n

\u201cCyber is a global problem, and we are all fighting the same cyber battle,\u201d said Pennsylvania N.G. Lt. Col. Cristine Pierce, the Cyber Shield deputy director. \u201cSo why not come together and unify with our international partners to combat a threat that we are all facing?\u201d<\/p>\n

Cyber Shield\u2019s expanding global participation has demonstrated how international partnerships will continue to be the best defense against an enemy who has no borders.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s important to show that we are united, capable of working with each other and capable of learning from each other,\u201d said Czech Republic Army 2nd Lt. Edita Bozkova, a network analyst.<\/p>\n

Although the Norwegians have proven to be fierce competitors, Voll said they won something far more valuable than a trophy.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe biggest win for us is being able to strengthen the cooperation between our nations,\u201d Voll said.<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.nationalguard.mil<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheNationalGuard<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/x.com\/USNationalGuard<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.nationalguard.mil\/Leadership\/Joint-Staff\/J-5\/International-Affairs-Division\/State-Partnership-Program\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Minnesota National Guardsmen and Norwegian officers work together during the annual Cyber Shield training event held at the Virginia National Guard\u2019s State Military Reservation in Virginia Beach, 30 May – 13 June, 2025. Cyber Shield is the longest-running and largest Department of Defense cyber exercise, comprising nearly 900 National Guard and Army Reserve Soldiers, Airmen, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":482750,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-482748","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=482748"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482748\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":482751,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482748\/revisions\/482751"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/482750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=482748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=482748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=482748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}