Category: IA News

Earlier this month, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Advisory Council released the Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) Subcommittee interim report. The report focuses on the spread of violent extremist ideology and the recruitment of American youth to extremist groups, and how DHS can leverage partnerships in multiple sectors to counter such recruitment. The subcommittee’s report asserts that […]

On June 22, Acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense and Global Security Thomas Atkin told members of the House Armed Services Committee that the Department of Defense (DoD) has made significant progress in implementing is cyber strategy. In his address, Atkin spoke of our increasingly interconnected world and our increasing vulnerability to cyberattacks. According to […]

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently published a report on the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) implementation of the National Disaster Recovery Framework, which provides the overarching interagency coordination structure for the recovery phase of incidents and calls for a “whole community” approach to recovery. The report, GAO-16-476, examines FEMA’s implementation of the framework in Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, New […]

Nearly 800 representatives from U.S. government agencies, private industry, and foreign nations recently participated in Cyber Guard 2016, a nine-day exercise that concluded on June 18. U.S. government participants included representatives from the FBI and the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security, among others. Non-government entities included power companies and port facilities. This year’s Cyber Guard exercise scenarios involved […]

Last week, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) issued guidance on national security professional development interagency personnel rotations. On June 15, Acting Director Beth F. Cobert announced OPM’s guidance aimed at assisting participating agencies in meeting the requirement mandated by section 1107(e) of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013. The guidance encourages agencies to […]

On June 9, RAND Corporation released two reports examining the deployment of Department of Defense (DoD) civilians. The full case study is included in Expeditionary Civilians: Creating a Viable Practice of Department of Defense Civilian Deployment, and while a shorter report, Expeditionary Civilians: Creating a Viable Practice of Civilian Deployment Within the U.S. Interagency Community and Among Foreign […]

Scientists at Walter Reed Army Institute of Research are making progress on a Zika virus vaccine, and plan to start human testing later this year. Efforts to produce the vaccine and prepare for the spread of the virus have included components of the Department of Defense, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the […]

In May, the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) released their Joint Strategy on Countering Violent Extremism (CVE). The joint strategy builds on the foundation of the 2015 White House CVE Summit and provides a “roadmap” for U.S. CVE efforts. In his opening message for the strategy, Secretary of State John […]

Earlier this month, U.S. Southern Command (Southcom) commander Navy Admiral Kurt W. Tidd spoke on the region’s greatest security challenge during a media roundtable at the Pentagon – illicit networks. According to Tidd, while Southcom’s area of responsibility has not seen ongoing conflict in some time, “it’s not a region that is without challenges … [and] […]

The State Department recently released the 2015 Country Reports on Terrorism. The reports assesses global terrorist threats, including terrorist groups such as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the use of chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) weapons. Many of the country reports also appraise U.S. involvement and interagency cooperation, calling for better coordinated […]