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Cybersecurity/News
FDA Introduces Medical Device Cybersecurity Assessment Plan; Aftin Ross Comments
by Monica Jackson
Published on April 23, 2018
FDA Introduces Medical Device Cybersecurity Assessment Plan; Aftin Ross Comments


FDA Introduces Medical Device Cybersecurity Assessment Plan; Aftin Ross CommentsThe Food and Drug Administration has announced a new project that aims to leverage the cybersecurity of medical technologies, FedScoop reported Friday.

The Medical Device Safety Action Plan will rely on the FDA’s previous rules around digital devices, as well as add industry experts onto the CyberMed Safety Analysis Board to assess the safety standards of medical products.

The plan also requires devicemakers to install a software patch, update capabilities and a “software bill of materials” in their products to encourage the FDA to modify its premarket guidance.

Aftin Ross, senior project manager at the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health, said the action plan aims to help devicemakers respond quickly to product issues.

Ross added that the new guidance will simplify the 806 existing reporting regulations which require device makers to report an issue and its consequences to the FDA within 10 days of its discovery.

President Trump allocated funds for the CyberMed Safety Analysis Board in his 2019 budget request to boost the FDA’s Expand the Digital Technology Industry program.

Civilian/News
Commerce Undersecretary Mira Ricardel Named Deputy National Security Adviser
by Jane Edwards
Published on April 23, 2018
Commerce Undersecretary Mira Ricardel Named Deputy National Security Adviser


Commerce Undersecretary Mira Ricardel Named Deputy National Security Adviser
Mira Ricardel

Mira Ricardel, undersecretary for export administration at the Commerce Department, will serve as deputy to national security adviser John Bolton, Politico reported Friday.

Ricardel’s appointment to the National Security Council came nearly two weeks after Bolton assumed his current post to replace the retiring Army Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster.

“I selected her as deputy national security adviser because her expertise is broad-based and includes national security matters related to our alliances, defense posture, technology security, foreign security assistance and arms control,” Bolton said in a statement.

Ricardel was involved in the development of national security policies and programs during her tenure at the departments of State and Defense. Her career at DoD included roles such as deputy defense assistant secretary for Eurasia, acting assistant secretary for international security policy and principal adviser to the defense secretary.

She led the DoD transition team following the 2016 presidential election and previously served as vice president of programs at nonprofit organization Freedom House.

Ricardel spent nearly 10 years at Boeing, where she served as a vice president with oversight on business development teams responsible for cybersecurity, satellites and missile defense markets.

DoD/News
Trump Issues New Conventional Arms Transfer Policy
by Jane Edwards
Published on April 20, 2018
Trump Issues New Conventional Arms Transfer Policy


Trump Issues New Conventional Arms Transfer PolicyPresident Donald Trump has signed a new memorandum that establishes a new policy on conventional arms transfers in support of the country’s economic and national security interests and in compliance with the Arms Export Control Act of 1976.

The new conventional arms transfer policy seeks to keep the U.S. technological edge over potential enemies; build up the defense industrial base to generate jobs; advance research and development; and expand partnerships that aim to extend the country’s global influence, according to the presidential memo published Thursday.

The memo calls for the secretary of State to work with secretaries of the departments of Defense, Energy and Commerce to develop and submit a proposed action plan for the policy’s implementation to the White House within the next two months.

The proposed plan should include short- and long-term measures the U.S. government should implement to build up its ability to communicate and support weapons transfers in support of national security interests and state the financial and staff resources to execute the policy “with minimal increase in the total of otherwise budgeted funds, with offsets identified if necessary.”

The policy also directs the secretaries of four federal agencies to draft a program that would align the country’s export policy for unmanned aircraft systems with economic and national security interests.

“The initiative should address the status of, and recommend next steps for, [Missile Technology Control Regime] adoption of revised controls for MTCR Category I UAS, consistent with the UAS export policy,” the memo added.

DoD/News
Heather Wilson: Air Force to Restructure Space and Missile Systems Center
by Jane Edwards
Published on April 20, 2018
Heather Wilson: Air Force to Restructure Space and Missile Systems Center


Heather Wilson: Air Force to Restructure Space and Missile Systems Center
Heather Wilson

The U.S. Air Force plans to reorganize the Space and Missile Systems Center by fall 2018 in order to speed up the acquisition process and eliminate silos among organizations, Defense News reported Thursday.

“It will have a production corps. It will have a development corps. It will have an architect,” Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson told reporters during a roundtable Tuesday at the Space Symposium in Colorado.

The report said the chief architect will oversee the synchronization of programs across SMC.

Wilson, a 2018 Wash100 recipient, said the reorganization aims to set up offices that focus on partnerships and innovation and added that the service expects the new center to achieve initial operating capability in October.

DoD/News
Army, Marine Corps Plan Ground Force Modernization Efforts
by Joanna Crews
Published on April 20, 2018
Army, Marine Corps Plan Ground Force Modernization Efforts


Army, Marine Corps Plan Ground Force Modernization EffortsU.S. Army and Marine Corps officials have said both service branches aim to prioritize modernization programs as part of efforts to help ground forces engage in complex security environments, DoD News reported Thursday.

Gen. John Murray, the Army’s deputy chief of staff for programs, told members of the House House Armed Services Committee’s tactical air and land forces subcommittee Wednesday the branch plans to modernize equipment to address near-term readiness goals.

Murray added that focus areas include next generation combat vehicle, long-range precision fires and soldier lethality.

Lt. Gen. Robert Walsh, commanding general for the Marine Corps Combat Development Command and deputy commandant for combat development and integration, told the subcommittee the branch plans to invest in information warfare, air defense command-and-control, mobility protection and force dynamics.

DHS/News
Senate Passes Bill to Establish DHS Bug Bounty Program
by Nichols Martin
Published on April 20, 2018
Senate Passes Bill to Establish DHS Bug Bounty Program


Senate Passes Bill to Establish DHS Bug Bounty ProgramThe Senate has voted unanimously in favor of a bill that would establish a bug bounty pilot program to strengthen cyber defense at the Department of Homeland Security.

Sen. Maggie Hassan’s (D-N.H.) office said Wednesday the Hack DHS Act would offer payments for white-hat hackers to identify vulnerabilities in the department’s information technology network and data systems.

The bipartisan bill mandates that DHS launch an effort similar to the Defense Department‘s bug bounty program and requires background checks for participants.

DHS manages the security of .gov domains and U.S. critical infrastructure.

Hassan introduced the bill with Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio.

Sens. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., and Kamala Harris, D-Calif., serve as co-sponsors for the bill.

Civilian/News
Air Force, OPM, NBIB Establish Interview Hubs to Address Security Clearance Backlog
by Jane Edwards
Published on April 20, 2018
Air Force, OPM, NBIB Establish Interview Hubs to Address Security Clearance Backlog


Air Force, OPM, NBIB Establish Interview Hubs to Address Security Clearance BacklogThe U.S. Air Force has begun to collaborate with the National Background Investigations Bureau and the Office of Personnel Management to expedite the security clearance process and help reduce the investigation backlog, Federal News Radio reported Thursday.

Maj. Kathleen Atanasoff, a spokeswoman for the Air Force, said the service, OPM and NBIB have started to set up centralized hubs to facilitate security clearance interviews without requiring applicants to travel to Washington.

Atanasoff told the station the service and NBIB have established interview hubs at Joint Base San Antonio in Texas, Tidewater in Virginia and Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio with plans to set up additional sites later this year.

“The NBIB is surging investigators to other Air Force bases with high caseloads, such as Hill Air Force Base in Utah, Warner Robins in Georgia and several bases in the surrounding Los Angeles area,” she added.

The report said the Air Force launched in May 2017 a process that aims to help NBIB identify investigations that need to be prioritized and immediately completed in order to meet mission-critical requirements.

 

DoD/News
Navy to Activate USS Portland Amphibious Transport Dock
by Nichols Martin
Published on April 20, 2018
Navy to Activate USS Portland Amphibious Transport Dock


Navy to Activate USS Portland Amphibious Transport Dock

The U.S. Navy has announced it will commission the San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock to be named USS Portland at the Port of Portland in Oregon during a ceremony to occur on Saturday.

The Defense Department said Thursday Deputy Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan will provide the commisionning’s principal address.

Bonny Amos, wife of the U.S. Marine Corps‘ 35th commandant, will order the ship’s activation as USS Portland’s sponsor.

San Antonio-class ships are made to support over 800 marines, and accommodate aircraft such as the CH-53E Sea Stallion and MV-22 Osprey.

The 27th Navy LPD will be the third ship to carry the name of Portland, the largest city in Oregon.

The first USS Portland was a heavy cruiser that served in World War II operations concerning Guadalcanal, Leyte Gulf, Corregidor and Okinawa; while the second was a dock landing ship that supported Lebanon peacekeeping missions and Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Civilian/News
NSA Selects 6 Labs for Security Research Initiative
by Joanna Crews
Published on April 20, 2018
NSA Selects 6 Labs for Security Research Initiative


NSA Selects 6 Labs for Security Research InitiativeThe National Security Agency has awarded five-year contracts to six multidisciplinary laboratories at U.S. research institutions to support security research efforts and transition ideas to real-world application.

NSA said Wednesday the awardees are small laboratories located at the Carnegie-Mellon University, International Computer Science Institute, North Carolina State University, University of Illinois-Champaign, Vanderbilt University and University of Kansas.

The lablets are part of the agency’s Science of Security and Privacy Initiative and the agency selected them after a competitive solicitation of proposals from approximately 300 universities nationwide.

Selection criteria include the scientific process of research projects; applicability to modern challenges; and capacity to expand a scientific community in the security and privacy areas.

Lablets will kick off 20 research projects that encompass challenges in cyber-physical systems, policy-governed secure collaboration, cybersecurity metrics, scalability and composability, resilient architecture, privacy and understanding and accounting for human behavior.

NSA launched its SoS Initiative in 2012 to promote security and privacy science as a research field and encourage researchers to develop new methodologies.

DHS/News
Kevin Roney: SoSOA Program Needs to Focus on User-Centered Feature
by Monica Jackson
Published on April 20, 2018
Kevin Roney: SoSOA Program Needs to Focus on User-Centered Feature


Kevin Roney: SoSOA Program Needs to Focus on User-Centered FeatureKevin Roney, principal data scientist at the Department of Homeland Security’s science and technology directorate, has said there is a need for the department’s analytics enhancing system to make its user-centered feature as its focal point.

DHS said Thursday Roney expects the System of Systems Operational Analytics program to sustain itself and provide an elaborate tutorial for future government employees to allot more time and effort in training workers in disparate information systems.

The U.S. Secret Service and Customs and Border Protection have started using the beta version of SoSOA to modify the computing capability and process of complex systems to help users make better decisions.

USSS, CBP and the National Protection and Programs Directorate will use the capability to monitor their operations, which includes how they leverage technology and their workforce.

“All of the current customers are very excited about SoSOA, because it attacks a problem they have not been able to address before. These groups are even eager to give S&T access to their information to help them achieve their goals,” Roney said.

DHS S&T aims to develop a small scale prototype of SoSOA at the end of 2018, which will possibly lead to more component operations beyond USSS, CBP and NPPD.

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ExecutiveGov, published by Executive Mosaic, is a site dedicated to the news and headlines in the federal government. ExecutiveGov serves as a news source for the hot topics and issues facing federal government departments and agencies such as Gov 2.0, cybersecurity policy, health IT, green IT and national security. We also aim to spotlight various federal government employees and interview key government executives whose impact resonates beyond their agency.

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