The Department of Homeland Security‘s office of the inspector general has suggested that the Customs and Border Protection revise its privacy policies and require more specific privacy training for Office of Professional Responsibility employees to help address law enforcement priorities.

According to a DHS OIG report published in August CBP OPR employees have shared information with other federal agencies which violated the Privacy Act of 1974 as well as DHS policies and did not appropriately document disclosure of the sensitive personally identifiable information (PII).

The report noted two DHS investigations on individuals who trained people on counter-measure techniques for passing polygraph exams and discovered that CBP OPR shared PII with almost 5,000 individuals from other agencies.

DHS OIG added it believes the manner in which PII information was shared showed a lack of regard for individuals’ privacy and attributes the incidents to CBP OPR’s mentality to prioritize the accomplishment of its law enforcement mission over the responsibility to protect individuals.

Defense Secretary Ashton Carter has said the U.S. and the U.K. will continue to work together as part of the coalition campaign to defeat the Islamic State militant group and other  international threats, DoD News reported Wednesday.

Cheryl Pellerin writes Carter addressed the role of the U.S. and the U.K. against those threats during his speech at the Oxford University’s Blavatnik School of Government.

“We’re fighting in different ways, across all domains, to destroy both the fact and the idea of an Islamic state based on ISIL’s barbaric ideology,” he said.

“Thanks to the contributions and sacrifices of our local partners there in the region and of British, American and coalition service members, we’ve accelerated the military campaign and we have the momentum firmly on our side.”

The report said Carter noted that the coalition aims to defeat the militant group by the end of the year through the help of local forces as they can hold and govern reclaimed territories.

The coalition’s development and diplomatic organization will also work to create plans to support peace and stability once the Islamic State group is defeated, he added.

Carter said the U.S. will also aid the U.K. and NATO to address Russian aggression and challenges posed by China, North Korea and Iran.

The U.S. government has offered approximately $115 billion in weapons, military equipment and training to Saudi Arabia since President Barack Obama took office in 2009, Reuters reported Wednesday.

Yara Bayoumy writes a report by William Hartung of the Center for International Policy stated that 42 separate deals contained the offers which include small arms and ammunition, tanks, attack helicopters, air-to-ground missiles, missile defense ships and warships.

The offers are reported to Congress and could become formal agreements, amended or abandoned and the report did not specify how many of the offers were agreed upon, Bayoumy wrote.

Hartung’s report gathered data from the Defense Department‘s Defense Security Cooperation Agency which provides figures on arms sales proposals and foreign military sales deals, Reuters stated.

Internal National Security Agency documents on the Iraq war have revealed that former NSA director Michael Hayden called for cooperation within the agency to support surveillance efforts as part of an “intelligence-driven” initiative against terrorism, Motherboard reported Tuesday.

Jason Koebler writes a 2008 Freedom of Information Act request led to the publication of approximately 70 documents called WARgrams that Hayden sent to select NSA employees in 2003 and 2004 to provide updates on the war against al-Qaida.

Hayden detailed a “Iraq Battle Bridge” plan to provide access to NSA’s surveillance operations center for personnel involved in the war, Koebler reports.

“The lessons we learned from the Iraq Battle Bridge will help shape and inform our response to the next crisis,” the former NSA director wrote, according to the report.

The report said the WARgrams also indicate a shift in NSA’s focus from battlefield support to an expansion of the agency’s surveillance infrastructure in efforts to prevent future operations by al-Qaida.

The Government Accountability Office has called on the Defense Department to develop a comprehensive plan and related metrics to implement readiness recovery goals.

GAO said Wednesday the military services reported that their readiness levels continue to decline due to what they described as “emerging and continued demands on their forces, reduced force structure and increased frequency and length of deployments.”

“The [DoD] recognizes that more than a decade of conflict, budget uncertainty and force structure reductions have degraded military readiness,” according to GAO.

GAO examined data on reported readiness rates and departmental readiness rebuilding efforts and found that those efforts are at risk because the DoD has yet to adopt key elements of sound planning.

“Key elements of sound planning for results-oriented outcomes include a mission statement supported by long-term goals, strategies for achieving the goals, metrics and an evaluation plan to determine the appropriateness of the goals and effectiveness of implemented strategies,” GAO noted.

GAO also concluded that the plan developed by each military service, based on the force elements that experienced high rates of deployments and readiness recovery challenges, were incomplete.

The government watchdog noted that the DoD ordered the military services to develop a plan on rebuilding readiness in 2014 and the services submitted the plans to DoD in 2015 without defining comprehensive strategies.

“Without DOD incorporating key elements of sound planning into recovery efforts, and amid competing priorities that the department must balance, successful implementation of readiness recovery plans may be at risk,” GAO said.

The Defense Department plans to hinder the fiscal year 2017 defense spending plan proposed by House Majority Leader Paul Ryan through a set of strategies outlined in an internal strategy memo, Defense News reported Tuesday.

Joe Gould writes the May 13 memo uncovered Pentagon’s plan to tap lawmakers to vote against Ryan’s defense spending proposal and the department’s attempt to influence legislators in their decision whether to add $18 billion in wartime Overseas Contingency Operations funding to the bill.

DoD Comptroller Mike McCord and Assistant Defense Secretary for Legislative Affairs Stephen Hedger prepared the five-page memo for Defense Secretary Ashton Carter and Deputy Secretary Bob Work, according to the report.

The memo suggests an assault against Ryan’s defense spending plan through a presidential veto threat that Pentagon seeks to boost with support from top Democratic leaders, Politico reported Tuesday.

Defense News reports the memo also recommends an informational campaign through fact sheets, opinion pieces and meetings with lawmakers and think tanks, and meetings with Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada), House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-California), Senate Armed Services Committee Chair John McCain (R-Arizona) and Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Thad Cochran (R-Mississippi).

The goal is to raise the argument that the proposal of Ryan, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, would impair the nation’s defenses, Austin Wright and Jeremy Herb report.

Politico reports the White House opposes Ryan’s plan to increase the Pentagon’s budget without raising domestic funding.