RESTON, Va. — December 20, 2022 — Noblis, Inc., a leading provider of science, technology and strategy services to the federal government, today announced the award of U.S. patent 11,522,783 for a system that applies basic network tracing tools to develop a better overall awareness of the physical nodes that carry traffic through the internet.

“We often think of ‘the cloud’ as an amorphous thing,” said Erica Maciejewski, a Noblis data scientist and co-inventor of the system. “But it is very much a structure of nodes that exist in a physical location. With a better understanding of that physical structure and how data traffic moves through it, we can add a new, enriched level of cyber awareness.”

Using basic traceroute commands to “ping” a network, Noblis’ system collects and aggregates data on how information flows through its nodes.

“By pinging from many distributed locations, we can create a more accurate picture of the nodes that are the building blocks of the internet,” said Eric McCabe, a lead software engineer and co-inventor. “By watching how these nodes act over time, we can develop an enriched picture of what they are, where they are and who is controlling them.”

“We foresee strong cybersecurity applications for this technology,” said Chris Barnett, Noblis’ chief technology officer. “The data it provides can help large, distributed organizations, such as government departments and agencies, better understand where their data goes, boosting their threat detection and vulnerability management capabilities.”

Learn more about Noblis’ capabilities, our internally sponsored research and development program and other patents.

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Heather Williams
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