Aerospace Corp. President and CEO Steve Isakowitz spoke with Aerospace DAILY ahead of the Space Symposium about cyber security, technology trends and an initiative to increase diversity in the space workforce.

We’ve been increasingly hearing about cyber security risks to satellites. What are ways to add security?

We are learning the first shot of war these days is not actually a shot. It’s the cyber attack that happens. I was just reading that Finland is now becoming a new member of NATO, and the Russians are threatening them. They were saying that they expected the way that the Russians might try to retaliate is not by firing a shot, but by cyber attacks in Finland, and they’re trying to harden themselves accordingly. 

In terms of the threats, we stood up something called Sparta, which is a tool available to industry that allows companies go through the checklist of best practices to make sure that their systems are protected going to space, as well as looking at issues on supply chain.