Page 32 - Cyber Defense eMagazine August 2023

Achieving Optimal Zero Trust Maturity: The

Role of Data and Governance

By Carolyn Duby, Chief Technology Officer, Cloudera Government Solutions

The federal government has placed a stronger emphasis on zero trust since OMB’s federal zero trust
strategy memo from the beginning of 2022, requiring agencies to have a security model in place that
assumes every device, application, or user attempting to access a network cannot be trusted.

Most recently, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued a second version of
its Zero Trust Maturity Model (ZTMM 2.0), which provides a roadmap to guide agencies to a zero trust
model by 2024. The ZTMM is a combination of five pillars: identity, devices, networks, applications and
workloads, and data. It also addresses four levels of maturity, providing useful information for agencies
regardless of their location on the zero trust journey (traditional, initial, advanced, optimal).

With the impending deadline, the Department of Defense is feeling the pressure and making strides
toward implementing the ZTMM to reach the “optimal” stage of maturity. DOD’s approach to a zero trust
strategy will equip the Department with the guidelines to instill the “never trust, always verify” mindset,
along with a map of how to implement the zero trust strategy across all components of the agency,
including capabilities, technologies, solutions, and processes.

Cyber Defense eMagazine – August 2023 Edition 32
Copyright © 2023, Cyber Defense Magazine. All rights reserved worldwide.