Systems Engineering

December 19, 2018 Leave a Comment

Systems engineering is the design, development, and management of complex systems of software. The systems engineering process starts by defining customer needs and functionality, then creating a holistic design to ensure the customer’s needs are satisfied in a high quality, reliable, and cost-efficient manner throughout a system’s entire life cycle.

Rivera Group helps our clients develop and maintain secure systems and systems operations by providing expertise in systems engineering. Our engineers deliver the following services:

Manage and monitor the infrastructure and installed systems
Install and configure systems
Plan and develop customized systems
Perform systems administration
Provide configuration management
Maintain infrastructure availability
Monitor and test application performance
Manage security and backups
Test systems and perform quality assurance testing

We help organizations plan and adapt to complex business requirements while maintaining a stable, secure and manageable operating environment. When developing a solution, we consider the affected enterprise systems along with the people, processes, and technology. We define functional requirements, document processes and interrelationships, and design solutions that are efficient and cost-effective.

Over 25% of our staff has an active security clearance and deep expertise working on sensitive projects for government agencies. This experience enables our company to take on a broad range of engineering tasks on both classified and unclassified systems.

Our Systems Engineering Experience
Learn how Rivera Group developed FISMA compliant databases for USAID. Learn More >

Tools and Techniques

Rivera Group uses the latest systems engineering tools and methodologies to optimize the development and maintenance of critical systems.

Our team is experienced in many engineering processes including agile engineering, scrum development, and waterfall development. In agile, we bring an incremental, iterative approach to the system development process by working in sprint cycles. This allows our team to perform quality testing throughout the entire development process.

Our engineers also use the scrum development framework, which is similar to agile engineering. Our team divides the project into tasks and works in timeboxed sprint cycles. Using scrum provides us with the flexibility to adapt to changing requirements during the system development process.

In addition, our team has experience working with the waterfall methodology. During this type of process, our engineers work in a sequential development approach compared to an iterative process. Waterfall methodology is useful in certain legacy environments which have a very rigid set of requirements.

Rivera Group’s systems engineers leverage the latest technologies to meet our client’s needs. We deliver expertise in the following tools:

JIRA. Our team uses this tool to track issues and bugs during the systems development process. With this software, we also send updated reports to our clients on the status of the project. This allows us to deliver high-quality products to satisfy our customer’s quickly and accurately.
ArcGIS. We use ArcGIS to gather and record geographic information, create and use maps, and analyze geographic information.
CORE. We use CORE to model system architecture prior to development, which allows us to integrate requirements, identify system functionality, simulate system performance, and trace system architecture from system to component levels.

Benefits

Rivera Group’s systems engineers are dedicated to solving our client’s most challenging IT infrastructure needs while providing the following benefits:

Qualified and experienced engineers drive performance up and cost down
Proficiency in emerging technologies lower risk with system migrations
Cleared resources available to support classified systems from day one

IT Operations and Maintenance

December 19, 2018 Leave a Comment

IT operations and maintenance, or IT O&M, is the process of monitoring, upgrading, and maintaining an organization’s applications and IT infrastructure on a continuous basis. IT O&M is critical in keeping IT systems and networks secure and operating effectively and efficiently.

Rivera Group works with the DOD and other federal agencies to keep their IT systems running smoothly by managing change, monitoring performance, and supporting users. Our highly trained IT professionals can easily shift between cutting-edge technology and legacy systems. In support of IT operations and maintenance, we offer the following services for our clients:

Help Desk support
Tier 1, 2, 3, & 4 support
Network and systems administration
Database administration
Application and hardware support
Configuration management
Software maintenance and upgrades
IT infrastructure optimization
WAN/LAN operation support
Data backups

Our IT Operations and Maintenance Experience
See how Rivera Group provides world-class IT support for the development of a critical patient portal for this federal healthcare provider. Learn More >

Tools and Techniques

Our staff is current on the latest technologies and play an integral role in testing, evaluating, and implementing new and emerging capabilities for our customers, which results in seamless integrations between the old and new enterprise technologies. To provide advanced IT O&M, our team leverages the following tools:

WireShark. Our team uses WireShark, a network protocol analyzer, to understand what is happening on the network at the micro level.
Ansible. This tool allows our administrators to automate routine IT maintenance tasks to improve efficiency.
Netcat. We use Netcat to quickly and securely send and receive network port information.

Rivera Group uses a structured, replicable, and dependable approach to software maintenance and upgrades that includes strict adherence to a comprehensive software maintenance plan. Our structured process for software maintenance includes analyses of each software maintenance request to ensure validity, the development of the proposed enhancement or modification, the documentation of the proposed solution for approval, and confirmation of the final approval to proceed. Once the enhancement or modification has been approved, we proceed with deployment. Post-deployment reviews ensure final deployment meet all requirements and standards.

Our team also supports upgrades to operating systems, applications, and hardware components to ensure upgrades are fully tested and operational before deployment into production. We are equipped to handle everything from large-scale migrations to new platforms to minor upgrades and patch level enhancements. We also provide assistance in updating print media and online help, as well as documentation updates for all system and application enhancements to provide end-users with the latest support.

Benefits and Results

Whether we are providing network support for email and data backups, documentation on a disaster recovery plan, designing and implementing a physical and logical storage array, providing WAN/LAN support or maintaining patches, our IT administrators carefully evaluate and monitor your systems and services to deliver optimal performance to meet or exceed your objectives.

Our team is dedicated to keeping our client’s IT systems and networks secure and operating effectively and efficiently. Our expertise in IT O&M delivers the following benefits to our clients:

Reliable and time and cost-efficient help desk support
Immediate accessibility to new software functionality through rapid technology insertion
Resolution to complex issues with minimal to no disruption of operations, service delivery, or functionality

Intelligence Operations

December 19, 2018 Leave a Comment

Intelligence Analysis

Intelligence operations and analysis is the process of collecting and analyzing information from multiple sources to gain actionable intelligence on competitors or adversaries. For the U.S. Government, intelligence analysis is vital to delivering foreign intelligence and counterintelligence to the nation’s leaders for the purpose of making data-driven decisions that safeguard the country.

At Rivera Group, our analysts and engineers understand the need to have detailed and reliable information at the time it is most needed. Our team delivers advanced intelligence analysis and operations and provides the following services:

Target intelligence
All-source intelligence
Indications and Warnings (I&W)
Application and dissemination
Web and application development
All-source intelligence collection management
Intelligence Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) planning
Counterintelligence and human intelligence (CI/HUMINT)

Our Intelligence Operations Experience
See how Rivera Group supports security operations for this US intelligence agency through advanced intelligence analysis and operations. Learn More >

Tools and Technologies

Rivera Group’s analysts conduct a full range of all-source intelligence research and analysis to produce intelligence assessments of foreign military and political influences. Our team analyzes, interprets, evaluates, and integrates extremely complex all-source intelligence data pertaining to battle, force structure, strategic and conventional military capabilities, and key military leadership. We then prepare and disseminate our extensive assessments to decision makers.

We collect, identify, collate, document, disseminate, and maintain big data necessary to produce accurate and actionable intelligence analytics. To do this, we use a variety of the latest tools and technologies including:

Tripwire Analytic Capability (TAC). Rivera Group uses TAC to provide interfaces to existing data and analytic services. Our analysts also combine multiple data feeds to create unique data fusion opportunities. We build detailed assessments and reports of changes to data within TAC, and we customize TAC for each client to maximize data manipulation to meet customer intelligence analysis requirements.
Analyst Notebook. Rivera Group leverage’s IBM’s Analyst Notebook application to evaluate big data and generate intelligence reports. Our team uses this tool to build connected network visualizations, conduct social network analysis, and produce geospatial or temporal views to uncover hidden connections and patterns in data. This tool allows our analysts to better identify potential threats.
Palantir. Rivera Group’s SMEs use Palantir, a tool that allows us to extract insight from massive-scale data of disparate types, from signals intelligence to unstructured data. We search through every piece of enterprise data at high speed, pinpointing significant intelligence and performing multi-dimensional analysis to reveal unseen patterns, connections, and trends in big data.
ArcGIS. We use ArcGIS to build maps, compile geographic data, analyze mapped information, share geographic information, and manage geographic information in a database.
WebTAS. Our team employs WebTAS to query enterprise data and deliver advanced data visualization capabilities while providing uniform access to multiple external data sources.
Combined Information Data Network Exchange (CIDNE). We use CIDNE to securely collect tactical information from various U.S. military personnel.

Benefits

Rivera Group delivers advanced intelligence analysis and operations to support mission-critical objectives. Our team provides the following benefits as a part of intelligence operations and analysis:

Intuitive and actionable intelligence products through advanced configurations and automation
In-depth intelligence reporting through complex all-source intelligence analysis
Accurate intelligence analytical products through big data management
Actionable analytics through all-source intelligence, counterintelligence, and human intelligence

Software Engineering

December 19, 2018 Leave a Comment

Agile software engineering is the process to expedite the engineering, design, development, and maintenance of software through a collaborative effort of adaptive planning, evolutionary development, rapid delivery, and continual improvement. The agile process encourages a rapid and flexible response to ever-changing customer needs.

At Rivera Group, we understand the growing need for agile processes to develop high-quality software, improve project management, and reduce program risks and costs. Our capabilities span software applications, web applications, and internal and external websites, while providing the following services:

Requirements and detailed specifications development
Software analysis and evaluation
Application design
Code development and implementation
Testing and integration
Identification and correction of code errors
Program documentation
Software maintenance
Enhancement and modification of existing software

Our Software Engineering Experience
See how Rivera Group uses agile software engineering to develop a program for self-installation for a university-affiliated research center. Learn More >

Tools and Technologies

Our team of software engineers formulate and define specifications and modify and maintain complex applications. We perform these functions using a variety of modern programming languages including:

Java
Python
JavaScript
C#
C++
PHP
Perl

We also implement database technologies, including Microsoft SQL, to securely store and manage sensitive data.

In addition, we support ad-hoc customer requests to evaluate existing and new software code. Then, our software engineers maintain and improve the applications to exceed the requirements in improved performance, additional capabilities, and lower cost of ownership.

To deliver top-of-the-line software engineering services, we harness the power of agile throughout the full software development life cycle (SDLC). Our team integrates testing during the SDLC to continuously add improvements and correct any errors before delivery.

Our team is experienced in developing applications around the agile engineering process:

Requirement gathering and analysis. Align business requirements with the software development plan.
Design. Define the overall application architecture.
Implementation. Produce coding to build the application based on requirements developed in the first phase.
Testing. Ensure the product is solving the needs addressed in the requirements and analysis phase.
Evaluation. Deploy the software to the client and begin maintenance to solve any additional needs.

Benefits and Results

Rivera Group uses agile software engineering to not only meet but to exceed our client’s needs and ensure mission success. While providing these services, Rivera Group offers the following benefits:

Improve software functionality through code enhancements and modifications
Develop easy-to-use applications by automating many manual, error-prone processes and improving graphical user interfaces
Deliver faster ROI by utilizing agile processes to reduce development and deployment time and costs
Reduce the risk of coding errors and creating vulnerabilities by continuously adding improvements and correcting errors throughout the full software development life cycle
Sustain changing requirements, even in late development

Information Risk Management

December 19, 2018 Leave a Comment

Risk Management Framework

Risk Management Framework (RMF) is a government mandated process that integrates information security and risk management activities into the system development life cycle (SDLC) to secure computers, networks, and critical IT infrastructures. This includes the technologies, tactics, and design techniques, as well as education and certification requirements to secure applications and networks in private and public sector organizations.

Rivera Group’s cybersecurity professionals have established extensive experience with Enterprise Mission Assurance Support Service (eMASS), Assured Compliance Assessment Solution (ACAS), Army Logistics Information System Update (ALIS-UP), and Independent Verification and Validation (IV&V). We use these tools to give our clients assurance their information is safe, secure, and available for only those who have a need-to-know. As a part of RMF, we deliver the following to our clients:

Patch management
Vulnerability management
Independent verification and validation for government acceptance tests
Plan of Actions and Milestones (POA&Ms) for systems
System accreditation
Continuous monitoring

Our Information Risk Management Experience
See how Rivera Group’s information risk management professionals helped this DoD agency reach complete cybersecurity compliance. Learn More >

Tools and Technologies

Rivera Group’s cybersecurity professionals conduct a comprehensive assessment of the management, operational, and security controls employed within or inherited by an information system. We identify and evaluate all applicable controls for each assigned system by following the assessment guidelines in NIST SP 800-53A, whether it is an initial self-assessment of a system undergoing RMF authorization for the first time or a system transitioning from DIACAP to the full continuous monitoring phases of the RMF cycle.

Our RMF team conducts risk assessments by identifying internal and external threats and determining what adverse impacts could occur if those threats and vulnerabilities should materialize. We adhere to the guidelines in NIST SP 800-37 Guide for Applying the Risk

Management Framework to Federal Information Systems, which is an effective information security risk management program that requires individuals at each level of the organization understand their roles and responsibilities in providing adequate security and for managing the risk associated with the information system. Our RMF team provides our customers the reassurance their systems will meet all federal requirements to operate while still maintaining a strong level of user confidentiality, data integrity, and system availability.

Benefits

Rivera Group is dedicated to meeting your RMF requirements to ensure compliance while providing the following benefits:

Reduced cyber vulnerability risk through quick and accurate patch management
Increased Cyber Command Readiness Inspection (CCRI) results
Strengthened security posture through RMF continuous monitoring
Accelerated ATO approval
Time savings with customized documentation templates

Cyberspace Operations

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Cyberspace operations is the management and employment of business operations and cyberspace capabilities within the cyber domain consisting of systems, networks, and critical infrastructures. Cyberspace operations is used for collecting, analyzing, storing, disseminating, and managing information and sensitive data. Cyberspace is broken down into three interrelated layers:

Physical network
Logical network
Cyber-persona

At Rivera Group, our team of cyberspace operations professionals is experienced in military cyberspace operations and provide expertise to assist our clients in achieving mission success. To accomplish goals in or through cyberspace, Rivera Group delivers the following services:

Cyberspace operations planning and coordination
Cyberspace operations capability analysis
Cyber intelligence analysis
Defensive cyber operations
Cyber deterrence
Tracking and reporting
Preemptive cyber actions
Remedial testing

Tools and Technologies

To deliver our client’s the capability to harness the full power of cyberspace operations, our team of experts use the latest tools and technologies including:

Industry-standard cybersecurity applications
Software applications developed by JHU APL specifically for the U.S. government
Dagger. Dagger is a modeling and visualization platform that shows how system failures impact mission status. It is updated with manual or real-time status and is used for mission/system planning, situational awareness during mission execution, and course-of-action analysis.
EAGLE6 Software. This is an innovative cyber intelligence platform designed for enterprise visualization and management. It provides actionable analytics and a comprehensive view of how enterprise systems – composed of hardware, software, people, processes, and business plans – are interdependent to meet mission objectives, adapt to change, and secure critical information in near-real-time. Rivera Group developed and deploys EAGLE6 software to auto-ingest and model enterprise data for quick and accurate cyberspace operations analysis.

Rivera Group identifies, develops, and prioritizes cyberspace operations requirements, processes, and procedures. Our cyberspace operations analysts provide assessments for capability development requirements, the concept of operation documents, and systems architectures. We also address areas of concern for the development of cyberspace capabilities for cyberspace operations.

Benefits and Results

Rivera Group is at the forefront of cyberspace operations analysis, providing innovative services and solutions to meet mission objectives in and through cyberspace. Our knowledge and expertise offer the following benefits to our clients:

Deliver a complete and interactive visualization of cyberspace terrain for military leadership to overcome geography challenges
Fast remediation of threats ranging from nation-states to natural hazards by identifying, localizing, and prioritizing vulnerabilities and threats
Efficient and effective cyber operations planning and execution through intelligence analysis and cyberspace operations impact analysis
Provide access and expertise to the latest JHU APL-developed cyberspace technologies, Dagger, and EAGLE6 software
Augment the cyber operations staff shortage to sustain critical services by providing professionals with the requisite security clearances and industry certifications to meet and exceed customer requirements

Cybersecurity

December 19, 2018 Leave a Comment

Cybersecurity is the protection of computer systems, networks, software, and electronic data. We use cybersecurity analysis to plan and carry out security measures to protect an organization’s networks, systems, and infrastructure, as well as manage risks related to the use, processing, storage, and transmission of data in an enterprise. Undesirable intrusions, such as those made by hackers or unauthorized users, or inadvertent connections which occur due to architectural deficiencies, pose significant threats to systems and an organization’s mission objectives.

Rivera Group’s team of cybersecurity experts keep our client’s cyber domain safe and current with all security measures by providing:

System accreditation
Vulnerability assessments
Risk management
Risk analysis reporting
Patch management
Data classification

Our Cybersecurity Experience
See how Rivera Group leverages EAGLE6 software to automatically identify vulnerabilities and compliance violations for this federal healthcare provider. Learn More >

Tools and Technologies

To help our clients pass security inspections and maintain continuous compliance, we use the latest security tools and technologies to research and proactively address vulnerabilities across various systems:

Army Logistics Information Systems Update (ALIS-Up). Rivera Group’s team of cybersecurity professionals developed ALIS-Up to automate the delivery of Information Assurance Vulnerability Alert (IAVA) security patches. To meet the frequency of IAVA patch downloads, we implemented business rules for incorporating ALIS-Up into the IT architecture and for the automated help desk, ticketing, and configuration management processes.
Assured Compliance Assessment Solution (ACAS). Our team uses ACAS to deliver automated network vulnerability scanning, configuration assessment, and network discovery. This allows us to scan the infrastructure, receive alerts, and manage and generate reports against vulnerability and compliance requirements.
Security Content Automation Protocol (SCAP). Rivera Group automates vulnerability management, measurement, and policy compliance evaluation of systems through the SCAP method. This provides our team with a ranking system to evaluate the impact of security issues, software flaws, and configuration issues.
HP Fortify. To ensure compliance with security inspections and regulations, Rivera Group uses HP Fortify for identifying, fixing, and preventing security vulnerabilities in applications and systems through security testing. Our team identifies, prioritizes, and corrects vulnerabilities within this software application.

Rivera Group’s cybersecurity professionals conduct a full vulnerability review including:

Vulnerability Scan. Search the environment for vulnerability and monitor and track the status.
Vulnerability Identification. Pinpoint the location of the vulnerability.
Notification. Notify the asset owner of the vulnerability and its location.
Remediation. System owner reviews the impact of the vulnerability and executes a remediation strategy.
Verification Test. Validate patching to ensure successful elimination of the vulnerability.

Benefits

Rivera Group secures your critical networks, systems, and infrastructure by:

Mitigating Vulnerabilities. With continuous security testing, Rivera Group ensures reduced vulnerability risk by implementing patch management.
Meeting Compliance Regulations. Our team validates compliance with security regulations and inspections by preventing and resolving vulnerabilities in various networks and systems.
Increasing System Security Awareness. Through continuous monitoring, we deliver notifications in real-time for quicker vulnerability remediation.