NATO Infrastructure Services Centre - (NISC) Consultant

Spektrum supports apex purchasers (NATO, UN, EU, and National Government and Defence) and their Tier 1 supplier ecosystem with a wide range of specialist services. We provide our clients with professional services, specialised aerospace and defence sales, delivery, and operational subject matter expertise. We are looking for personnel to join our team and support key client projects.

Who we are supporting 

The NATO Communication and Information Agency (NCIA) is responsible for providing secure and effective communications and information technology (IT) services to NATO's member countries and its partners. The agency was established in 2012 and is headquartered in Brussels, Belgium.

The NCIA provides a wide range of services, including:

• Cyber Security: The NCIA provides advanced cybersecurity solutions to protect NATO's communication networks and information systems against cyber threats.
• Command and Control Systems: The NCIA develops and maintains the systems used by NATO's military commanders to plan and execute operations.
• Satellite Communications: The NCIA provides satellite communications services to enable secure and reliable communications between NATO forces.
• Electronic Warfare: The NCIA provides electronic warfare services to support NATO's mission to detect, deny, and defeat threats to its communication networks.
• Information Management: The NCIA manages NATO's information technology infrastructure, including its databases, applications, and servers.

Overall, the NCIA plays a critical role in ensuring the security and effectiveness of NATO's communication and information technology capabilities.

The program

Assistance and Advisory Service (AAS)

The NATO Communications and Information Agency (NCI Agency) is NATO’s principal C3 capability deliverer and CIS service provider. It provides, maintains and defends the NATO enterprise-wide information technology infrastructure to enable Allies to consult together under Article IV, and, when required, stand together in the face of attack under Article V.

To provide these critical services, in the modern evolving dynamic environment the NCI Agency needs to build and maintain high performance-engaged workforce. The NCI Agency workforce strategically consists of three major categorise's: NATO International Civilians (NIC)'s, Military (Mil), and Interim Workforce Consultants (IWC)'s. The IWCs are a critical part of the overall NCI Agency workforce and make up approximately 15 percent of the total workforce.

Role Duties and Responsibilities

• Establishing project specifications and technical direction;
• Leading, coordinating and reconciling differences in the production of the System Requirements Specifications (SRS) as part of the Sole Source Contract;
• Overseeing the software design, development, testing and acceptance project stages;
• Participating to all project meetings, as required;
• Revision of technical documentation from the main contractor;
• Participating to PBs/SLMBs (Project Board/Service Level Management Board) as technical lead, as required;
• Guiding team members with troubleshooting technical issues;
• Analysing existing operations to identify risks and redundancies;
• Supporting the Project Manager in providing technical clarifications;
• Provide technical expertise in order to assure coherence with digital transformation initiatives, such as Data Centric Security (DCS).

They are requested to participate and provide expert support to NCI Agency in the execution of Project NSP019104 – Provide Data Centric Security Milestone 1- Basic Labelling, advancing the following objectives:

• Develop and coordinate the SRS;
• Overseeing the execution of the project technical stages;
• Provision of technical input related to the project deliverables to different internal and external stakeholders, when required.
• Provision of technical expertise in order to assure coherence with digital transformation initiatives, such as Data Centric Security (DCS);
• Support the project team in achieving project milestones (CAW, PSA, FSA and JFAI).

Essential Skills and Experience

• Expert knowledge of NATO’s Data Centric Security (DCS) and Zero Trust vision and strategy, along with expert technical knowledge of enablers such as the NATO Metadata Binding Service and NATO End Point Labelling demonstrators;
• Expert knowledge of Industry and NATO standards in the area of labelling, binding and marking;
• Expert knowledge of NATO Confidentiality Label Syntax specifications, profiles and emerging standards;
• Expert knowledge of NATO Metadata Binding Mechanism specifications, profiles and emerging standards;
• Expert knowledge of NATO Core Metadata Specification, profiles and emerging standards;
• Expert knowledge of NATO Core Data Framework (NCDF) and related profiles and emerging standards;
• Detailed knowledge of NATO’s STANAG (including ADatP-4774 and ADatP- 4778) and IEPD processes;
• Detailed knowledge of NATO cross-domain solutions and information exchange requirements;
• Detailed knowledge of FMN concepts, evolutionary strategy and the NFIP;
• Detailed knowledge of AFS concepts, evolutionary strategy and the AFS Joining Instructions;
• Detailed knowledge of methods and mechanisms to resolve security label translation/mapping between NATO and NATO national systems;
• Detailed knowledge of federated Identity and Access Management (IdAM) policies, standards and industry trends;
• Detailed knowledge and experience with Web Service-specific security standards and products including Security Policy Information File (SPIF), OIDC, SAML 1.x and 2.0, XACML, WS-Security, WS-Trust, Microsoft Active Directory Federation Services (ADFS), and competing products in this space;
• Detailed knowledge and experience with Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) implementation concepts including Web Services, SOAP, REST, Publish-Subscribe, JSON, XML, WSDL and UDDI, as well as Web Services specifications;
• Detailed knowledge and experience with specific security areas including PKI, X.509, and products including Microsoft Certificate Services and Entrust Certificate Authority. Knowledge of the Enterprise NPKI would be beneficial;
• Expertise in commercial security labelling products and object level protection solutions;
• In-depth familiarity with NATO organisational and political structures and relationships with NATO and Partner nations;
• Good understanding of cryptography;
• Ability to independently produce and edit technical documentation and scientific reports in English;
• Excellent communications skills;
• Good understanding of the project management methodologies, including PRINCE 2 and Agile/Scrum.

Working Location

• Remote

Working Policy

• Off-Site

Travel

• Some travel to other NATO sites may be required

Security Clearance

• Valid National or NATO Secret personal security clearance