Metova CyberCENTS
Transforming Cybersecurity Squads through Emulation

The internet is a digital emulation of our real world; the towering cyber attacks mirror the field battles, and cybersecurity engineers resemble the brave soldiers who defend our ‘digital borders’. With every bit of our day-to-day information now online, one security breach could result in devastating consequences. For Bill Dunn, President of Metova CyberCENTS, such ever-increasing “cyber warfare” calls for a “military approach” to train cybersecurity engineers through constant practice and exercise in tandem with advanced technological utilization. “Apart from a steep rise in cyber attacks, the situation has been worsened by the shortage of domain-qualified workforce and enterprises are now increasingly adopting this novel approach and our groundbreaking solutions.” The company, a division of Cabot, Arkansas-based Metova Federal LLC, builds customized cyber simulators and cyber range environments wherein cyber exercises, mission rehearsals, and competitions prime individuals from defense organizations, banks, governments, industries, and universities in the art of modern cyber defense.

Metova CyberCENTS’ simulators expose trainees to various network situations and threats while advancing their technical skills in cyber protection, and mission-critical operations. The simulators are scalable—each simulator is designed according to a customer’s exact requirements—and offer a risk-free, independent simulated network environment that accurately emulates customers’ operational network. The operators can perform aggressive activities in the simulated network to disrupt a network’s integrity, infiltrate dummy networks to gather intelligence, and learn advanced network protection tactics. This not only allows the operators to spot loopholes in their operational network but also helps them learn newer techniques and ideas to identify and combat security threats.

The company offers a family of Hardware-in-the-loop cyber simulators under the name of CENTS^® (Cyber Operations Enhanced Network and Training Simulators) which are operated by the SLAM-R^©—the simulator and range automation engine. The family of solutions also comprises of internet routers, core network protocols, security boundaries, physical-virtual hardware, software, and other complex components that power the precise simulation of a client’s operational network.

There are four platforms within the CENTS portfolio. HOTSIM^® (Hands- On Training Simulator) and CYNTRS^® (Cybersecurity Network Training Simulator) are on-site LAN solutions that assist in training individuals and teams in cybersecurity operations respectively. In addition, there is VCCE^® (Virtualized Cyber Classroom Environment), which is an open source virtual platform where multiple teams can be trained on different items simultaneously. To connect all the CENTS routers, a novel RGI^® solution (Range Global Internet) mimics the global internet covering traffic generation, IP infrastructure, web activities, and even social media. This allows organizations for collaborative cyber testings and training with allies without any disturbance on their individual real-world operational networks. Further, a uniform GUI runs on top of all these CENTS solutions that facilitates easy learning and adoption of these four platforms.

Our simulators expose trainees to various network threats, advancing their cyber protection and mission-critical operational skills

“Practical hands-on training is, always, more effective than traditional learning methods. Our cost-effective solutions revolutionize and speed-up practical training to enable clients to build competent, mission-qualified teams that can deliver unprecedented efficiency in the cyberspace,” mentions Dunn. A customer can even use the simulators for recruitment purposes and test third-party vendor products. In tandem with these solutions, the firm also provides certified engineering professionals who extend professional services such as cyber operations training, cyber competitions planning and execution, vulnerability management, and cybersecurity support.

Agility is central to Metova CyberCENTS’ product development process and is reflected in its regular adoption of cutting-edge technologies in addition to boosting performance and security. The company aims to integrate advanced LMS, Mission Retrospective Module, and Virtual Machine Instrumentation technologies and expand into Asia and Europe in the near future.