Lauren Knausenberger, chief information officer at the Department of the Air Force and a 2021 Wash100 Award recipient, said that DAF has a four-pronged plan to transform its information technology environment for both Air Force and Space Force missions.
Knausenberger told FedTech in an interview that the department seeks to incorporate zero trust, cybersecurity, DevSecOps, network and cloud elements into the digital foundation for the military's Joint All-Domain Command and Control strategy.
JADC2 is the military's concept of creating an integrated sensor network on the battlefield to inform commanders and their decisions.
In the interview, Knausenberger also noted that DAF is working to measure what affects the warfighter and further build its digital workforce through education as well as address outdated policy, redundant information technology and manual processes.
“The biggest game-changer that I hope to see us do over the next year is to get to one secret network. Being able to collapse into one operational environment and take advantage of modern technology in a faster way across our enterprise," she said.
The DAF CIO also mentioned the department's roadmap to guide the implementation of zero-trust security approaches and its enterprise strategy that covers automation and segmentation processes.
When asked about DAF's use of DevSecOps, Knausenberger said the department uses the method in most of its software development efforts such as those led by the Kessel Run unit.
