For many, the words "homeland security" and "counterterrorism" conjure up images of federal investigators engaged in large-scale battle with a host of enemies bent on death and destruction. But the war often begins on a smaller, more subtle level.
The Department of Homeland Security is adapting intelligence community tools to facilitate information sharing among its diverse elements. These include social media-based successes as well as information fusion centers across the nation.
A little-known U.S. Army site at Picatinny Arsenal, New Jersey, is developing software to resolve data sharing issues between the three New Jersey nuclear power facilities and the state’s data fusion center in West Trenton—information sharing that would be critical in case of a nuclear disaster. The nuclear power plants and the state’s data fusion hub use two different decision support systems that are incapable of sharing data.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency have called upon industry to develop a low-cost and secure communications, network management and situational awareness system for the U.S. military, public safety agencies and commercial clients.
Gnostech Incorporated, Warminster, Pennsylvania, is being awarded a $13,512,796 indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity, cost-plus-fixed-fee contract to provide information assurance-related services in support of Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security programs. Support will include certification and accreditation documentation, security and certification test and evaluation, security control compliance evaluation, data recovery/prevention services, network security services, and information assurance planning and coordination. Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center Pacific, San Diego, California, is the contracting activity.
Network situational awareness, largely the purview of military systems, may be the best line of defense against cybermarauders threaten the nation's critical infrastructure.
The nation's critical infrastructure, long a potential target of cybermarauders, now faces even greater threats--ironically because of the very information technologies on which it depends for better efficiency of operation.
The U.S. Coast Guard is looking at a variety of options for adding maritime versions of unmanned air vehicles (UAVs) to its sea assets. These vehicles would be used to maintain persistent presence in remote ocean areas.
Cybercrime legislation should be technology agnostic to ensure technological advances do not make the laws obsolete, says James A. Baker, deputy attorney general for the U.S. Justice Department. Baker testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee during a September 7 hearing on updating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act to combat emerging cyberthreats.
A science-based software tool for the iPad allows first responders to learn from models of building damage and other conditions that occur after a disaster. Developed by Sandia National Laboratories, the Standard Unified Modeling, Mapping and Integration Toolkit (SUMMIT) enables firefighters, medics and police officers to visualize damaged buildings.
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