Posted on 09/16/2009 3:50:09 PM PDT by optiguy
IMMEDIATE RELEASE No. 713-09 September 14, 2009
DoD Announces New Information-Sharing Access to Help Fusion Centers Combat Terrorism
The Departments of Defense (DoD) and Homeland Security (DHS) today announced an initiative to grant select state and major urban area fusion center personnel access to classified terrorism-related information residing in DoD’s classified network.
Under this initiative, select fusion center personnel with a federal security clearance will be able to access specific terrorism-related information resident on the DoD Secret Internet Protocol Router Network (SIPRNet)—a secure network used to send classified data. This classified data will be accessed via DHS’ Homeland Security Data Network (HSDN). DHS will be responsible for ensuring that proper security procedures are followed.
“With this action, DoD continues its work in supporting states and localities who are leading our efforts to secure the nation from domestic terrorism attacks, said Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense and Americas’ Security Affairs Paul N. Stockton. “We look forward to exploring other opportunities where DoD can help our state and local partners effectively defeat terrorism.”
“This initiative reflects the federal government’s strong commitment to improve information sharing with our state, local, and tribal partners,” said DHS Acting Under Secretary for Intelligence and Analysis Bart R. Johnson. “Fusion centers are a critical part of our national security enterprise, and this new tool enables federal agencies to share information with these partners while utilizing our advanced technical capabilities for secure information sharing.”
This joint initiative will promote collaboration between DHS, DoD and other federal departments and agencies, enabling the trusted and secure exchange of terrorism-related information in order to detect, deter, prevent and respond to homeland security threats.
State and major urban area fusion centers provide critical links for information sharing between and across all levels of government, and help fulfill key recommendations of the 9/11 Commission. This initiative will serve as a valuable resource to enhance situational awaeness and support more timely and complete analysis of national security threats.
Increasing the breadth of law enforcement that have access to terrorism-related data will further improve the ability of fusion centers to prevent, detect, deter, and respond to terrorist attacks, and advance the combined missions of DHS and DoD to protect the nation’s security.
DHS and DoD remain committed to protecting privacy and civil liberties as well as data and networks in an increasingly vulnerable cyber environment.
“fusion center personnel with a federal security clearance will be able to access”
just “federal security clearance”????? Shouldn’t it be “Secret” level or above?
8888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888
As of July 2009, there were 72 designated fusion centers around the country with 36 field representatives deployed. The Department has provided more than $254 million from FY 2004-2007 to state and local governments to support the centers.
The Homeland Security Data Network (HSDN), which allows the federal government to move information and intelligence to the states at the Secret level, is deployed at 27 fusion centers. Through HSDN, fusion center staff can access the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), a classified portal of the most current terrorism-related information.
http://www.dhs.gov/files/programs/gc_1156877184684.shtm
Yeah, Right.
You'd think so.
Anyone else getting the feeling they are getting ready for a ‘round up’ to the trains?????
Some where I read on the internet that trains were being converted into prison cars somewhere in europe. cars being fitted with iron bars and such. Dunno if it’s true, would not surprise me one bit.
DEFENSElink.mil (AMERICAN FORCES PRESS SERVICE): Washington - "PENTAGON TO SHARE TERRORISM INFO AT LOCAL LEVEL" (SNIPPET: "Pentagon officials will begin sharing access to classified, terrorism-related information stored on the secure Defense Department network with state and local agencies. Officials will make the information available using a Department of Homeland Security computer network that ties together that department's intelligence centers nationwide. Dubbed "fusion centers," these intelligence-gathering offices reside in most states and larger cities and share information with the federal government, as well as with other agencies in their area. As of this summer, there were 72 such centers.") (September 15, 2009)
DEFENSElink.mil - Release No. 713-09: "DoD ANNOUNCES NEW INFORMATION-SHARING ACCESS TO HELP FUSION CENTERS COMBAT TERRORISM" (SNIPPET: "With this action, DoD continues its work in supporting states and localities who are leading our efforts to secure the nation from domestic terrorism attacks, said Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense and Americas' Security Affairs Paul N. Stockton. "We look forward to exploring other opportunities where DoD can help our state and local partners effectively defeat terrorism."") (September 14, 2009)
Just goes to prove that it isn’t a good idea to drink and read....
I don’t drink at all, but thanks for your useless and stupid comment.
Just goes to prove that it isn’t a good idea to use hallucinatory drugs and read....
I'm running out of explanations for your hearing about all those big ships with steel cages coming to get us!
Allowing DHS on SIPRnet seems .... unsound.
I said that I read that trains were being converted into prison cars, not ships. Perhaps it is you who needs to practice sobriety while reading.
Hmmm! Just how are those prison cars with all those steel bars going to get from Euroland to here?
So I say again: "I'm running out of explanations for your hearing about all those big ships with steel cages coming to get us!"
I didn’t say prison cars were coming here. I only said that I read of their construction within Europe.
Perhaps you should keep your words within your own mouth.
ADDING to post no. 7 — Note: The following text is a quote:
http://www.defenselink.mil//news/newsarticle.aspx?id=55939
Departments Negotiate Pact to Help Keep Country Safe
By Gerry J. Gilmore
American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, Sept. 22, 2009 – An agreement between the departments of Defense and Homeland Security that calls for sharing some intelligence data with emergency operations centers nationwide is part of post-9/11 efforts to harden America against another terrorist attack, senior department officials said recently.
The more than 60 emergency operations centers — also known as “fusion centers” — are managed by state and local agencies. The centers collect information that can be used to combat terrorist threats or for responding to natural or man-made disasters.
Both the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 and the 9/11 Commission report published in 2004 state “that we were not doing sufficient information sharing between federal agencies and state and local agencies,” Michael McDaniel, deputy assistant secretary of defense for homeland defense strategy and force planning, said during a recent interview with The Pentagon Channel and American Forces Press Service reporters.
DHS became involved in helping state and local officials establish fusion centers in their jurisdictions, McDaniel said. “That was great as a first step. But, one of the questions still was: ‘How do you share this information?’” he said.
“The whole concept of a fusion center – what’s inherent in the word ‘fusion’ – is a collaboration of information across multiple agencies at multiple levels,” McDaniel said, “so that that information comes to a common center-of-gravity, if you will, and at that point is shared,” as needed, with analysts from different agencies, including those working at the state and local level.
Much of the nation’s intelligence-gathering capability is contained within the Defense Department, McDaniel said. The Defense Department and DHS, he said, have been collaborating over the past few years to provide intelligence information to state- and local-agency analysts.
“Now we have a means in which DoD-provided information can be shared” with state and local officials, McDaniel said, noting that information about foreign-terrorist threats and capabilities “will be very helpful” to local and state law enforcement officials.
However, the Defense Department is not a law-enforcement agency, McDaniel emphasized. The department “does not collect, does not store information” about people, he said.
In October 2007, President George W. Bush established the National Strategy for Information Sharing, which mandates that the federal government share information with state and local agencies that can be used to combat terrorism and respond to natural or man-made disasters, said D. Joe Johnson Jr., DHS’s chief of policy, planning and liaison for its National Security Systems Program.
The two departments last month negotiated an agreement to allow security-cleared fusion center employees the ability to access certain Defense Department Web sites through DHS’s data network, Johnson said.
The Defense Department “does a lot of work overseas” gathering intelligence that’s used to monitor terrorist threats, he said.
Providing access to this information to security analysts at state and local agencies, Johnson said, enables them “to come to better and more-informed conclusions about threats that are happening outside the United States that could potentially occur inside the United States.”
Related Sites:
Defense.gov
Department of Homeland Security
Related Articles:
Pentagon to Share Terrorism Info at Local Level
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