Bringing a Cyber Mission System to Space: Method Awarded $30M STRATFI with US Space Force

Today we’re announcing Method has been awarded the maximum $30M STRATFI (Strategic Funding Increase) from the U.S. Space Force to accelerate cyber defense and deterrence in the space warfighting domain. This award is in partnership with the Defensive Cyber Operations for Space program and the 6th Sustainment Squadron under Mission Delta 6.

Method will scale its autonomous cyber mission system across the Space Force: from testing the cyber resilience of critical space assets to deterring adversaries who seek to disrupt them.

The security of space is now a prerequisite for American prosperity and deterrence. Today’s announcement reflects the urgency of that mission.

Space: The Race for Resilience

Space is a constant contest. Today, the decisive one is between the United States and China.

China is building systems to find, track, and target U.S. forces from orbit while fielding counterspace capabilities to blind, jam, disrupt, and destroy the systems we depend on.

500+ ISR-capable satellites. 140 launches targeted in 2026 alone. Their actions represent a clear strategy: make space decisive for China and unreliable for the United States.

Launch tempo and mass to orbit matter. But the winner of this race will not be the country that puts the most hardware in orbit. It will be the country that can sense, communicate, navigate, and fight with their infrastructure under constant attack.

The U.S. Space Force’s answer is space superiority: preserving freedom of action for the Joint Force while denying an adversary the same.

The Anatomy of a Cyber Attack on Space

Threats in space take many forms, but only one attack vector needs no rocket: cyber.

In the hour before Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, attackers neutralized a satellite network by entering through a VPN misconfiguration, moving through a trusted management segment, and using legitimate management commands to overwrite modem flash. Tens of thousands of terminals went dark across Europe.

A cyber attack on a space mission often reflects this exact pattern: a terrestrial intrusion that climbs a chain of trust until software can create a physical effect in orbit. In some cases it can employ exotic RF hardware or a zero-day in the flight software. More often than not, it entails the chaining of numerous, often simple, security flaws across assets.

Space cyber cannot be secured one asset at a time. Defenders must see and test their systems as attackers do: across identities, systems, command paths, data flows, authorities, and dependencies from ground to orbit to user.

They must secure the entire chain: satellites, ground stations, mission software, command links, contractors, infrastructure, power, and communications.

A Cyber Mission System for Space

There is no domain more urgently in need of autonomous cyber mission systems than Space, due to its size and expected growth. Method has spent the last two years building these systems.

We envision a world where Space Force Cyber Guardians have complete control, visibility, and force projection over their domain. That requires three things: reach, action, and trust.

These are core design principles behind Method’s cyber mission system - the same architecture that powers critical security work with our customers across the private sector and U.S. Government.

Reach

Method has architected for difficult deployments since day one. Space is the new and ultimate test.

We’ve focused on an architecture that can span classification echelons, run airgapped, deploy on kits, survive degraded comms, drive sensitive OT workflows, and operate across mission-specific hardware.

To reach the diverse terrain of space, we’ve created a command and control system that allows mission-tailored sensors to coordinate effects and maneuver against a common objective. Those sensors can exist across Linux, Windows, VxWorks, and custom platforms many decades old. They can be commanded across enterprise-aligned protocols and configurations.

Interoperability drives control. Control creates a live terrain model of the battlespace.

Action

The action plane of a space cyber mission system requires orchestration of work that looks very different from a typical enterprise security environment.

In a disconnected contractor enclave, there might be OT-specific tools that need careful running to perform an assessment. For programs backed by commercial cloud, typical cloud tradecraft and integrations apply. For workflows in orbit, there is likely bespoke hardware sensors to drive specific to that mission.

We’ve architected a tool framework specifically capable of handling this skew and controlling it in unison.

Trust

Finally, and most importantly, bringing cyber autonomy to space has to be trusted.

It has to be operator-governed. It cannot take down essential services. Space is as far from a sandbox as it gets.

This is where rigorous Rules of Engagement apply, informed by years spent studying the work of the world’s most critical cyber missions.

The Work Ahead

This STRATFI gives us the opportunity to deepen our work with Space Force and accelerate the deployment, integration, and validation of cyber capabilities across the space mission.

We built Method to support cyber operators like Space Force Cyber Guardians. If we serve them, we can play a small role in securing space on behalf of the United States.