For more information please contact:
Zenagui Brahim
President, NH MEP
603-226-3200
zenaguib@nhmep.org

NH MEP Hosts Cybersecurity Workshop for NIST SP 800-171 Program

Manchester, NH – On Tuesday, May 1st the New Hampshire Manufacturing Extension Partnership (NH MEP) partnering with the New Hampshire Government Contracting Assistance Center (www.nheconomy.com/sell- to-the-government), the New Hampshire Aerospace and Defense Export Consortium (www.nhadec.com) and Mainstay Technologies (www.mstech.com) ran their second Cybersecurity workshop at the Best Western Inn and Conference Center in Manchester, NH.

The workshop was geared to small and medium manufacturing enterprises (SME’s) who contract with the federal government in the defense and homeland security sectors. Seventeen New Hampshire manufacturers participated with a total of twenty-nine people attending. These included senior level managers, IT managers and their support staff, and other managers across their organizations.
The workshop focused on the cybersecurity standard as described in NIST Special Publication 800-171. The attendees reviewed the requirements of the standard and discussed a strategically phased approach to proper protection and compliance. This included a compliance gap analysis process, development of policies and procedures, implementing new information technology and security layers, continuous monitoring, and compliance and risk assessments related to the information security program.
Companies will now have to identify who is in charge of the information system, document inventory of all hardware and software systems and update them when configurations are made.

Ryan Barton, CEO of Mainstay Technologies, and the Instructor for the workshop had this to say, “NIST 800- 171 requires compliance with a high level of detail for 110 controls. The process of building the policies, technical controls, process changes, trainings, and the like can be absolutely overwhelming for a small business. So it was great to engage with so many small businesses in the workshop and assist in the journey of compliance.” Barton added, “It was a great and engaged room for the 3 hour workshop, and we very much enjoyed partnering with NH MEP for a direct and educational seminar.”

Zenagui Brahim, President of NH MEP said, “It was great to see so many New Hampshire manufacturers who do business with the U.S. Department of Defense attend this important Cybersecurity workshop. We plan to hold this workshop again in the near future and look forward to serving more manufacturers to help them become compliant with the NIST 800-171 standard.”

About NH MEP
The NH MEP is an affiliate of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) under the U.S. Department of Commerce. The national MEP system is a network of manufacturing extension centers that provide business and technical assistance to smaller manufacturers in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Through MEP, manufacturers have access to more than 2,000 manufacturing and business “coaches” whose job is to help firms make changes that lead to greater productivity, increased profits and enhanced global competitiveness. For more information please visit www.nhmep.org or call 603-226-3200.