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[infowar.de] The Department of Homeland Security: InformationAnalysis and Infrastructure Protection
Infowar.de, http://userpage.fu-berlin.de/~bendrath/liste.html
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Von Wanja Eric Naef's Infocon-Liste (www.iwar.org.uk).
RB
Url of the proposed Department of Homeland Security
http://www.whitehouse.gov/deptofhomeland/
General Section:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/deptofhomeland/toc.html
The Department of Homeland Security
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Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection
http://www.whitehouse.gov/deptofhomeland/sect6.html
The Department of Homeland Security would merge under one roof the
capability to identify and assess current and future threats to the
homeland, map those threats against our current vulnerabilities, inform
the
President, issue timely warnings, and immediately take or effect
appropriate
preventive and protective action.
Threat Analysis and Warning. Actionable intelligence is essential for
preventing acts of terrorism. The timely and thorough analysis and
dissemination of information about terrorists and their activities will
improve the government?s ability to disrupt and prevent terrorist acts
and
to provide useful warning to the private sector and our population.
Currently, the U.S. government has no institution primarily dedicated to
analyzing systematically all information and intelligence on potential
terrorist threats within the United States, such as the Central
Intelligence
Agency performs regarding terrorist threats abroad. The Department of
Homeland Security, working together with enhanced capabilities in other
agencies such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation would make America
safer by pulling together information and intelligence from a variety of
sources.
The prevention of terrorist acts requires a proactive approach that will
enhance the capability of policymakers and law enforcement personnel to
preempt terrorist plots and warn appropriate sectors. The Department
would
fuse and analyze legally accessible information from multiple available
sources pertaining to terrorist threats to the homeland to provide early
warning of potential attacks. This information includes foreign
intelligence, law enforcement information, and publicly available
information. The Department would be a full partner and consumer of all
intelligence-generating agencies, such as the Central Intelligence
Agency,
the National Security Agency, and the FBI. By obtaining and analyzing
this
information, the Department would have the ability to view the dangers
facing the homeland comprehensively, ensure that the President is
briefed on
relevant information, and take necessary protective action.
The Attorney General recently revised the guidelines governing how the
FBI
gathers information and conducts investigations. The new guidelines
reflect
the President?s commitment to preventing terrorism by allowing the FBI
to
intervene and investigate promptly, while also protecting American?s
constitutional rights, when information suggests the possibility of
terrorism. The revised guidelines empower FBI agents with new
investigative
authority at the early stage of preliminary inquiries, as well as the
ability to search public sources for information on future terrorist
threats. The FBI can now identify and track foreign terrorists by
combining
information obtained from lawful sources, such as foreign intelligence
and
commercial data services, with the information derived from FBI
investigations. In addition, the revised guidelines removed a layer of
"red
tape" by allowing FBI field offices to approve and renew terrorism
enterprise investigations rather than having to obtain approval from
headquarters.
The Department of Homeland Security would complement the FBI?s enhanced
emphasis on counterterrorism law enforcement by ensuring that
information
from the FBI is analyzed side-by-side with all other intelligence. The
Department and the Bureau would ensure cooperation by instituting
standard
operating procedures to ensure the free and secure flow of information
and
exchanging personnel as appropriate.
The Department?s threat analysis and warning functions would support the
President and, as he directs, other national decision-makers responsible
for
securing the homeland from terrorism. It would coordinate and, as
appropriate, consolidate the federal government?s lines of communication
with state and local public safety agencies and with the private sector,
creating a coherent and efficient system for conveying actionable
intelligence and other threat information. The Department would
administer
the Homeland Security Advisory System and be responsible for public
alerts.
The Department of Homeland Security would translate analysis into action
in
the shortest possible time ? a critical factor in preventing or
mitigating
terrorist attacks, particularly those involving weapons of mass
destruction.
Because of the central importance of this mission, the Department would
build excellence in its threat analysis and warning function, not only
in
terms of personnel, but also in terms of technological capabilities.
This proposal fully reflects the President?s absolute commitment to
safeguard our way of life, including the integrity of our democratic
political system and the essential elements of our individual liberty.
The
Department of Homeland Security will not become a domestic intelligence
agency.
Critical Infrastructure Protection. The attacks of September 11
highlighted
the fact that terrorists are capable of causing enormous damage to our
country by attacking our critical infrastructure ? those assets,
systems,
and functions vital to our national security, governance, public health
and
safety, economy, and national morale.
The Department of Homeland Security would coordinate a national effort
to
secure America?s critical infrastructure. Protecting America?s critical
infrastructure is the shared responsibility of federal, state, and local
government, in active partnership with the private sector, which owns
approximately 85 percent of our nation?s critical infrastructure. The
new
Department of Homeland Security will concentrate this partnership in a
single government agency responsible for coordinating a comprehensive
national plan for protecting our infrastructure. The Department will
give
state, local, and private entities one primary contact instead of many
for
coordinating protection activities with the federal government,
including
vulnerability assessments, strategic planning efforts, and exercises.
The Department would build and maintain a comprehensive assessment of
our
nation?s infrastructure sectors: food, water, agriculture, health
systems
and emergency services, energy (electrical, nuclear, gas and oil, dams),
transportation (air, road, rail, ports, waterways), information and
telecommunications, banking and finance, energy, transportation,
chemical,
defense industry, postal and shipping, and national monuments and icons.
The
Department would develop and harness the best modeling, simulation, and
analytic tools to prioritize effort, taking as its foundation the
National
Infrastructure Simulation and Analysis Center (currently part of the
Department of Energy). The Department would direct or coordinate action
to
protect significant vulnerabilities, particularly targets with
catastrophic
potential such as nuclear power plants, chemical facilities, pipelines,
and
ports, and would establish policy for standardized, tiered protective
measures tailored to the target and rapidly adjusted to the threat.
Our nation?s information and telecommunications systems are directly
connected to many other critical infrastructure sectors, including
banking
and finance, energy, and transportation. The consequences of an attack
on
our cyber infrastructure can cascade across many sectors, causing
widespread
disruption of essential services, damaging our economy, and imperiling
public safety. The speed, virulence, and maliciousness of cyber attacks
have
increased dramatically in recent years. Accordingly, the Department of
Homeland Security would place an especially high priority on protecting
our
cyber infrastructure from terrorist attack by unifying and focusing the
key
cyber security activities performed by the Critical Infrastructure
Assurance
Office (currently part of the Department of Commerce) and the National
Infrastructure Protection Center (FBI). The Department would augment
those
capabilities with the response functions of the Federal Computer
Incident
Response Center (General Services Administration). Because our
information
and telecommunications sectors are increasingly interconnected, the
Department would also assume the functions and assets of the National
Communications System (Department of Defense), which coordinates
emergency
preparedness for the telecommunications sector.
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