The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency has released an interim report providing updates on the activities of a task force created in 2018 to help assess and manage risks to the information and communications technology supply chain.

The ICT supply chain risk management task force has four working groups with specific areas of focus, the Department of Homeland Security’s CISA said. The first working group focuses on the sharing of actionable data about supply chain risks, while the second group deals with the evaluation of supply chain threats.

The two other working groups center their efforts on the identification of structures, processes and criteria for establishing Qualified Manufacturer Lists and Qualified Bidder Lists and development of policy recommendations to incentivize the procurement of ICT from authorized resellers and original equipment manufacturers.

Bob Kolasky, assistant director for CISA’s national risk management center, said at the CISA Cybersecurity Summit the ICT task force will kick off discussions about risk management challenges facing small- and medium-sized enterprises.

Officials at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency summit said security threats associated with 5G technology could require the involvement of the U.S. government, Federal Times reported Friday.

Christopher Krebs, CISA director and a 2019 Wash100 Award winner, said the lack of alternatives for smaller countries in need of 5G components presents an opportunity for the U.S. and its allies to come up with technology platforms to lead the 5G marketplace, which is dominated by foreign companies like Huawei.

Sen. Mark Warner, also a 2019 Wash100 Award recipient, said the government could play a role in helping develop alternatives.

“It will require active engagement of our government with one or more vendors to make sure we can say that … here’s our alternative and here’s how you can get it at, maybe not exactly the same price point as Huawei, but here’s where it’s not going to be twice as expensive,” Warner said.

A chemist from the Department of Homeland Security’s Transportation Security Laboratory has created an approach to detect contraband from luggage and clothing. Jim Deline, a scientist from TSL, has built a device that can gather traces of contamination through the use of a special swab, DHS said Thursday.

Additionally, screening officers can analyze and validate the presence of contraband by inserting the swab into an explosive trace detector. According to Deline, the approach will mitigate the need to obtain samples to confirm the substances as it converts chemicals to gas form.

“This rapid vaporization would prevent its interaction with the substrates, so the explosive could be deposited directly onto the substrates, obviating the dry transfer step,” added Deline.

NASA has connected the five main components of the Space Launch System launch vehicle’s core stage in preparation for a flight to the moon in 2024. The space agency said Friday that it conjoined the last sections of the core stage on Thursday at the Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans.

The 212-foot-tall stage is designed to generate 2M pounds of thrust to lift the Orion spacecraft for the first Artemis mission. The Artemis program aims to revive manned lunar exploration. Engineers attached an engine section, the stage’s final piece, to a liquid hydrogen propellant tank already docked to the other components.

The engine section featured systems that facilitate the control and delivery of fuel from propellant tanks to engines. The space agency will work with Boeing and Aerojet Rocketdyne this fall to integrate four RS-25 engines into the stage’s main propulsion systems.

“NASA and our contractor teams are making tremendous progress on every aspect of manufacturing, assembling and testing the complex systems needed to land American astronauts on the lunar surface by 2024,” said said Julie Bassler, SLS stages manager at NASA.

Derek Tournear, acting director of the Space Development Agency, unveiled the agency’s plans to establish seven “layers” of space defense during an Air Force Association event in Maryland, National Defense Magazine reported Thursday.

Tournear told reporters that the layers will include up to 400 small spacecraft and that each layer will encompass command-and-control, communications, sensing, battle management and navigation functionalities. The Air Force and National Reconnaissance Office’s systems will handle other missions involving technologies such as remote sensing, global communications and GPS.

“We are orchestrating the fielding and development of the next-generation national defense space architecture,” said Tournear. “So we’re working with a lot of other folks, especially the Air Force to make sure that all of those components necessary for the architecture get built out.”

SDA plans to launch demonstration satellites in fiscal 2021 and achieve an initial operating capability for its fleet of small spacecraft by 2024.

Anne Neuberger, leader of the National Security Agency’s new cybersecurity directorate, said her plans for the organization’s first 60 days would rely on joint, collaborative approach, Fifth Domain reported Thursday.

Her diverse team will consist of professionals from across different areas such as emerging technologies, threat intelligence and nuclear command and control, she said Wednesday at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s summit.

Neuberger said she intends to organize her team as a unified community with diversity as a strength. The directorate will work with the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security to operationalize threat intelligence for network defense.

NSA’s lessons learned over the past years will also inform the new directorate’s security standards and efforts to educate industry, she noted.