I found some details on Operation Eligible Reciever 97. Operation Eligible Receiver was a government exercise that was funded by the United States of America government ("C4I.org - The meaning of Eligible Receiver", n.d.). The exercise was planned and executed with little to no notice to the participants ("C4I.org - The meaning of Eligible Receiver", n.d.). The participants were the National Security Agency (NSA), the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the Department of Justice (DOJ), the National Reconnaissance Office, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the Defense Information Systems Agency, and the Department of State (DOS) ("C4I.org - The meaning of Eligible Receiver", n.d.). The National Security Agency was playing as the Red Team. Civilian providers that are critical to the government’s power and communication were also participants. The exercise took place in 1997 and the was a no-notice Joint Staff exercise designed to test DoD planning and crisis action capabilities when faced with attacks on DoD information infrastructures ("Interviews - John Hamre | Cyber War! | FRONTLINE | PBS", n.d.). The Red Team was played by the National Security Agency which used hacker techniques and software programs that were freely available on net ("Interviews - John Hamre | Cyber War! | FRONTLINE | PBS", n.d.). All of the software or programs they used to hack were available to the public. The National Security Agency had no inside information to work with but they were very diligent in extensive electronic reconnaissance of the participants. They were able to conflict much damage to the National Command Authority, Intelligence Agencies, and the military commands involved. Many of the vulnerabilities that were exploited were common among the participants ("Interviews - John Hamre | Cyber War! | FRONTLINE | PBS", n.d.). The National Security Agency gained root access to government agencies networks which allowed them to mess around with user accounts and access server hard drives ("Interviews - John Hamre | Cyber War! | FRONTLINE | PBS", n.d.). Specifically, the National Security Agency infiltrated and taken control of the U. S. Pacific Command computer systems along with 911 systems in major cities around the United States ("Interviews - John Hamre | Cyber War! | FRONTLINE | PBS", n.d.). The majority of the Operation Eligible Receiver remains classified but what was demonstrated was the lack of consciousness about cyber warfare ("Interviews - John Hamre | Cyber War! | FRONTLINE | PBS", n.d.). For the first three days, no one in the agencies knew anything about the attacks that were taking place ("Interviews - John Hamre | Cyber War! | FRONTLINE | PBS", n.d.). The agencies being attacked were completely unaware of the attacks. The National Security Agency did a very good job at masking their identity and the attacks ("Interviews - John Hamre | Cyber War! | FRONTLINE | PBS", n.d.). The bad thing about the agencies that were attacked was that they did not know the attacks were actual attacks ("Interviews - John Hamre | Cyber War! | FRONTLINE | PBS", n.d.). A lot of people say that the National Security Agency attacked and gained control of only a fraction of 1 percent of the network, but that fraction was what they needed to gain superuser rights to access the entire network ("Interviews - John Hamre | Cyber War! | FRONTLINE | PBS", n.d.). They could then infiltrate other networks connected and that would be more damaging. Our nation has come a very long way since then because there have been many other attacks on government agencies that the agencies have recovered remarkably from.

C4I.org - The meaning of Eligible Receiver. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://c4i.org/eligib.html

Interviews - John Hamre | Cyber War! | FRONTLINE | PBS. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/cyberwar/interviews/hamre.html