The Department of Homeland Security is collaborating with industrial control system vendors to test products to secure critical facilities such as power plants against cyber attacks, Cyberscoop reported Monday.

Jeanette Manfra, assistant director for cybersecurity at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, said at the Hack the Capitol conference in Washington, D.C. that the DHS aims to “have much more capability” to detect and mitigate attacks to ICS infrastructure and evaluate ICS products before they enter the market.

“We want the ICS community – and those are both the vendors and the operators of the system – to be able to be more empowered to defend themselves,” she said. According to Dragos, a Hanover, Md.-based ICS security company, one-third of the ICS security vulnerabilities identified by DHS in 2018 had errors on the scoring system for potential severity.

Michael Chasen, CEO at PrecisionHAWK USA, has been named chairman of the Federal Aviation Administration’s Drone Advisory Committee by Department of Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao. The 35-man committee was formed to help FAA address concerns and prioritize update efforts for unmanned air vehicles, the agency said Monday. The agency also appointed 12 new members from companies, government agencies and organizations that support drone initiatives.

“Michael and the DAC will help guide the FAA to build flexible, responsive regulatory processes that can keep up with the industry’s creativity while ensuring the highest level of safety,” said Daniel Elwell, acting administrator at FAA.

The committee’s appointees are:

• Bob Brock, director of aviation and UAS, Kansas Department of Transportation
• Chris Anderson, CEO, 3DR
• David Silver, vice president for civil aviation, Aerospace Industries Association
• Joseph DePete, president, Air Line Pilots Association
• Lorne Cass, vice president of regulatory affairs, American Airlines
• Mariah Scott, president, Skyward
• Mark Colborn, senior corporal, Dallas Police Department
• Michael Leo, captain, New York City Fire Department
• Michael Sinnett, vice president of product development and strategy, Boeing
• Peter Cleveland, vice president of law and policy group, Intel
• Thomas Karol, general counsel, National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies

The U.S. Navy’s top acquisition official wants to speed up the acquisition process, lower costs, new talent and industry partnerships to support the service’s modernization efforts, Defense News reported Monday. 

James Geurts, assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition, is fixing the service’s slow acquisition system. He said he wants to change transactional requirements with industry and technical experts to bring capabilities faster to the fleet. Geurts noted the changes will focus on cost and time.

“We’re looking at reducing government inspections by 50 percent,” he said. “We need to set the standards for shipbuilders in the ship repair world, and then let them go so that we are not unnecessarily holding up maintenance activities as they’re ongoing.” 

Contract vehicles would also help the Navy modernize its fleet. Geurts said the Navy’s future contract strategy will utilize multiple contracts to work with different vendors. 

The Department of Homeland Security issued an alert saying Chinese-built drones may be transmitting to manufacturers sensitive flight information that could be accessed by the Chinese government, CNN reported Monday.

The drones “contain components that can compromise your data and share your information on a server accessed beyond the company itself,” DHS’ Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said in the alert obtained by CNN.

“The United States government has strong concerns about any technology product that takes American data into the territory of an authoritarian state that permits its intelligence services to have unfettered access to that data or otherwise abuses that access,” CISA noted.

CISA warns users to practice caution when buying unmanned systems from China, remove digital cards and limit the drone’s access to networks to prevent data theft.

The DHS alert came days after President Trump signed an executive order declaring a national emergency to address foreign threats to the country’s information and communications technology supply chain.

Donald Parker, head of the Defense Information Systems Agency’s Public Key Infrastructure branch, said that DISA’s Purebred tool is “doing really well as a capability to support mobile credentialing,” the agency said Monday. Parker told attendees at a recent AFCEA event in Baltimore, Md. that PKI has emerged as the foundation for internet security and secure data transmission.

“Identification and authentication, data integrity, confidentiality, and technical non-repudiation combined are elements that provide a secure, non-breakable environment for any type of electronic transaction,” he noted.

Purebred handles PKI credentialing for Department of Defense devices and enables encypted communications without constant Common Access Card user requirements. DoD devices supported by the tool include Apple iOS and Android platforms, Windows 10 tablets and Yubikey systems. DISA has deployed Purebred to support credentialing for over 100,000 DoD-issued mobile devices to date, according to Parker.