MITRE Corp trying to match up with Israeli firm TOKA in cyber sphere

Recent news revealed that MITRE corp has been awarded a contract by the Department of State on 26 September to match up with cyber capabilities skills with Israeli firm TOKA which works with the governments of Moldova, Chile, Nigeria, and other countries.

Toka has been a renowned name in the cyber space. Recently, it raised $25 million in an early stage funding round led by Eclipse Ventures. The funds will be used to strengthen its efforts for developing intelligence-gathering platforms and products and advise governments on building a stronger cyber defence.

Toka was earlier an NSO Group competitor who got $12.5 million from Andreessen Horowitz, Dell Technologies Capital, LaunchCapital, Entrée Capital, and investor Ray Rothrock in a round of financing during the past year.

Toka, like the NSO Group, is regulated by the Israeli Ministry of Defense, which ultimately approves all exports of cybersecurity technologies that could be tools classified as cyber warfare. As described they only build intelligence tools, not offensive weapons and develop intelligence gathering technologies that empower law enforcement and intelligence agencies to strengthen homeland security.

Two Israeli companies Rafael and Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) are competing for a contract to establish a national Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) in Ghana too. Toka helped both Ghana and neighbouring Nigeria draw up their cyber-strategies. Israeli companies like Toka have been associated with various countries indicating that it may even be supporting key actors in MENA region like UAE, Saudi, Qatar, Turkey and probably even Iran.

However, there is a possibility that cyber space will take a flip very soon and Israeli firms may not enjoy their export monopoly of few technologies. MITRE is one such corporation supported by western governments to develop parallel cyber capabilities.

MITRE’s mission is to initially focus on Latin America as the region has become increasingly attractive to Chinese companies and Israeli companies have also put down solid roots in Latin American capitals in recent years.

MITRE Corp is a not-for-profit company, based in Virginia, United States which provides engineering and technical guidance for the federal government. Since then, MITRE has operated at the intersection of advanced technology and vital national concerns.

MITRE’s powerful intelligence tool gives cyber defenders a platform for instantly sharing detailed information on threats. Its release to the open source community marks an important step in the shift to active defense.