Experts Recommend Ways to Improve Intelligence Support to Critical Infrastructure Protection Efforts

The U.S. intelligence community should increase its role in protecting the nation’s critical infrastructures by becoming an active part of the operational aspects of safeguarding the essential services Americans have come to rely on. Intelligence agencies can and should be proactive in providing the information that federal, state and local organizations as well as the private sector need to ensure continuity of operations. However, to accomplish this task, a framework and methodology must be established that outlines a doctrine for intelligence support in the national critical infrastructure protection mission.

These are some of the conclusions and recommendations members of AFCEA International’s Intelligence Committee propose in their most recent white paper, “Intelligence Support to Critical Infrastructure Protection.” The paper, which was released after the 2008 Fall Intelligence Symposium so it could include discussions from the event, applauds the steps the federal government has taken to improve information sharing but advises that additional effort is needed.

One of the primary challenges to coordinating intelligence support to this security mission is the fact that approximately 85 percent of the infrastructure is owned by the private sector. In addition, current critical infrastructures are so intertwined that the cascading effect of a disturbance to one could exponentially increase its impact. Consequently, intelligence support in the area of the nation’s critical infrastructure is a complex undertaking.

The intelligence community is not designed to provide support to organizations outside of the government, the paper points out, nor is the framework in place to determine the goals that domestic operations should aim to achieve. To remedy this situation, Intelligence Committee members recommend that intelligence organizations delve into questions such as what makes a particular infrastructure critical, who owns the infrastructure that needs to be protected and how requirements for critical infrastructure protection can be defined.

“To reach the necessary understanding of what constitutes critical infrastructure, we propose the broad application of a decision framework to assist all who support the critical infrastructure mission, including the intelligence community,” Intelligence Committee members state. With a framework in place, key personnel of intelligence agencies could make decisions about which infrastructures will receive protection priority. The intelligence community then could mobilize its resources to determine threats, vulnerabilities and risk, then recommend or take countermeasures, committee members agree.

While the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) already has evaluated some of these issues, Intelligence Committee members say the results have not been broadly shared with intelligence community organizations. They suggest that the DHS undersecretary for intelligence and analysis is a natural bridge of this information-sharing gap because this person is in the unique position of belonging to both the critical infrastructure and intelligence communities.

As stated in the white paper, Intelligence Committee members also recommend that the intelligence community use the DHS’ 17 sector-specific plans methodology to formulate broad outlines of a doctrine for intelligence support to the national critical infrastructure protection mission. This approach would ensure that intelligence support operations could be fully integrated into doctrine at the national, regional and local levels. Once again, the logical person to lead this effort would be the DHS undersecretary for intelligence and analysis, committee members advise.

In terms of the private sector, Intelligence Committee members point out that the law and public policy issues necessary for intelligence community organizations to support the commercial side in the infrastructure protection mission must be addressed. While the white paper does not tackle this issue, committee members agree that it must be addressed, and the Obama administration may be the one to take on the task.

It is the consensus of the Intelligence Committee that the private sector has been collaborating and sharing information in many useful ways. The Information Sharing Analysis Centers, which exist for the majority of the 17 critical infrastructure sectors, are one example of these efforts. However, during the 2008 Fall Intelligence Symposium, panelists expressed frustration about the lack of a clearly identified federal “plug-in” point for industry’s efforts. As a result, the Intelligence Committee recommends that the director of national intelligence quickly designate an “entity” to be this plug-in point to the intelligence community.

In addition to these recommendations, the white paper emphasizes the importance of articulating requirements and priorities that the intelligence community can fulfill and focus on. Committee members propose that today’s homeland security missions require a new paradigm for intelligence support that includes a collaborative network of state, local, federal and private-sector leaders. “That network must be fully integrated into the traditional intelligence community as well as with new and essential partners at all levels of government and the private sector,” the paper states.