The Defense Department reduced its number of security clearance holders by 900,000 from fiscal year 2013 through the first quarter of fiscal year 2016 in an effort to address potential insider threats, the Federation of American Scientists reported Wednesday.

Steven Aftergood wrote in a FAS blog post that there are approximately 3.7 million employees and contractors at DoD that hold security clearances as of the first quarter of FY 2016 based on the agency’s Insider Threat and Security Clearance Reform report.

According to the report obtained by FAS, the number of DoD personnel with access to classified data increased to 2.3 million as of the first quarter of fiscal 2016 from the 2.2 million reported in the same period for fiscal 2015.

The report also showed that the State Department rolled out its own continuous evaluation pilot initiative, while the Pentagon increased the coverage of its CE pilot program to 225,000 personnel as of December 2015.

The Marine Corps Systems Command is working to complete the first phase in fielding its Tactical Service Orientated Architecture data-sharing software platform in support of efforts to consolidate various tactical data systems across combat operation centers.

The Marine Air-Ground Task Force Command, Control and Communications program management office designed TSOA to serve as a software suite that will feature common open architecture for command-and-control applications, the Marine Corps said March 17.

The service branch added it looks to replace obsolete software and multiple independent tactical data systems — which are sometimes incompatible — with TSOA in an effort to generate savings.

Maj. Austin Bonner, MC3 TSOA project officer, said the new system aims to help patrolling Marines access and exchange information across the service via a handheld device.

TSOA also includes the Marine Corps Software Resource Center app store, which will work to allow COCs to download mission-related tactical applications such as the Mobile Patrol Planning and Assessment Tool, the service branch said.

The software platform was last tested at the Agile Bloodhound 2015 warfighter technology integration and demonstration event where MCSC ran a trial on TSOA with the MP2AT app and the Small Unit Decision Aids app, the Marine Corps noted.

Exercise participants used the apps to record and relay information on their routes back to the COC.

A U.S. Army Cyber Command official has said the command has launched expeditionary cyber exercises designed to help combatant commanders and troops build up capabilities in cyber electromagnetic activities and assess potential threats, the Army reported Tuesday.

Brig. Gen. Patricia Frost, deputy commanding general for operations at the Army Cyber Command, discussed CEMA at a March 31 forum on Army Installation Management.

Frost said CEMA exercises seek to help commanders and soldiers navigate through the changing information environment.

According to the Army, CEMA is a tool designed to help commanders and military personnel protect the mission command system from potential adversaries through the synchronization of cyber space, spectrum management and electronic warfare operations.

Frost told forum attendees that the Army Cyber Command teamed up with the U.S. Army Forces Command, U.S. Training and Doctrine Command and combat training centers to conduct CEMA training exercises in an effort to identify software and hardware requirements.

She also noted that the command will hold another CEMA exercise in July to evaluate electronic warfare and its implications in terms of requirements and capabilities for operators and uniformed personnel, the Army said.

The U.S. Marine Corps has launched a cyberspace warfare group to help man, equip and train the military branch’s cyber mission teams to conduct defensive and offensive operations.

The service branch said March 25 the Marine Corps Cyberspace Warfare Group was officially activated during a ceremony held March 25 at Fort Meade in Maryland.

MCCYWG will support Marine Forces Cyberspace Command and U.S. Cyber Command.

“We’ve always had the means to communicate and the means to protect that communication, but today we’re in an environment where those methods are more and more reliant on a system of transmissions, routers and networks,” said Col. Ossen J. D’Haiti, commanding officer of the Marine Corps Cyberspace Warfare Group.

“So, the ability to protect that, the ability to control that and deny an adversary to interdict that, is crucial to command and control,” D’Haiti added.

The Marine Corps expects the group to be fully operational by fiscal year 2017.