FROM THE DESK OF CLEARANCEJOBS.COM
1. Going after the Threat Inside. Contributor Chandler Harris reports, “The federal government is implementing comprehensive and far-reaching internal threat security policies aimed at monitoring computer networks, as well as their employee’s behavior on them, with an unprecedented focus on preventing additional leaks. . . . Defense contractors are scrambling to address this cultural change with new products designed to monitor and prevent insider threats. Raytheon, Lockheed Martin and numerous start-ups have developed insider-threat detection products.”
2. The Insider Threat Task Force. Also from Chandler Harris, “While former NSA contractor Edward Snowden revealed that gaping security holes still exist of classified government information, the Obama administration has been waging a government-wide crackdown of security vulnerabilities since 2011 with its ‘Insider Threat Task Force.’ . . . This has helped create ‘toxic work environments poisoned by unfounded suspicions and spurious investigations of loyal Americans,’ according to current and former officials and experts . . . .”
THE FORCE AND THE FIGHT
1. Putin Takes Crimea: Russia’s new territory. Reuters’ Vladimir Soldatkin and Steve Gutterman report, “Russian President Vladimir Putin, defying Ukrainian protests and Western sanctions, announced on Tuesday that Russia would move forward with procedures to annex Ukraine’s Crimean region. . . . By pressing ahead with steps to dismember Ukraine against its will, Putin raised the stakes in the most serious East-West crisis since the end of the Cold War.” AP’s Vladimir Isachenkov reports, “Sunday’s referendum in Crimea . . . has also raised fears that Ukraine’s eastern provinces could try to hold their own independence votes.”
2. Military sexual assault debate: digging in. DefenseOne.Com contributor Stacy Kaper reports, “One court decision. Two polar-opposite conclusions. That’s the story on Capitol Hill on Monday after sexual-assault charges in a high-profile case against an Army general were thrown out in military court under a plea deal for lesser violations. The case further fueled Democrats’ intra-party fight over how to handle military sexual assault, a struggle that pits New York’s Kirsten Gillibrand against Missouri’s Claire McCaskill. Following the plea deal, both senators remained as dug in as ever.” Christian Science Monitor reports, “Advocacy groups say the plea deal, in which sexual assault charges were dropped against Brig. Gen. Jeffrey Sinclair, shows why military commanders should not have authority over such cases.”
3. Bombs in Kabul. AP’s Rahim Faiez reports, “A suicide bomber riding a rickshaw blew himself up outside a checkpoint near a market in northern Afghanistan on Tuesday, killing at least 15 civilians, officials said, in the latest attack in the countdown to next month’s presidential elections.”
4. al Shabaab continues to press. Reuters’ Abdi Sheikh reports from Mogadishu, “Somali Islamist militants drove a car bomb at a hotel in a town in central Somalia that was being used by African Union and Somali military forces, a resident and the militant group said. . . . The insurgent strike followed an attack on a military convoy near the capital Mogadishu on Monday which killed four Somali soldiers . . . . Al Shabaab was driven out of bases in the capital more than two years ago, but has continued to control swathes of countryside and smaller towns, which it uses as launchpads to strike.”
CONTRACT WATCH
1. Help wanted: cyber ninjas. NextGov.Com’s Aliya Sternstein reports, “The Pentagon is scouting for cyber ninjas in the private sector who would be available for future help dominating the cyber domain . . . . The trick will be finding potential ‘performers’ that hold security clearances for classified endeavors, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency officials said. Projects ‘to achieve cyberspace superiority require specialized knowledge, skills, and experience,’ states a request for company workforce information. ‘Ideally, respondents will include both potential performers currently holding security clearances and those who may be granted clearances based on technical capabilities and eligibility.’ . . . the Pentagon is asking private sector organizations for a Rolodex of current personnel with cyber ops experience, their clearance level and a narrative describing their skills.”
2. Big Buy: Dyncorp International, General Dynamics, KBR, Northrop Grumman circling like sharks. DefenseNews.Com’s Andrew Chuter reports from London, “As many as nine companies or consortiums may have passed the first hurdle in their efforts to acquire the UK’s Defence Support Group (DSG), the state-owned military vehicle and small arms maintenance and repair company put up for sale by the British government . . . . At least five of the companies approved by the Defence Ministry to move to the next stage of the bidding are thought to be US-owned . . . .”
TECH, PRIVACY, & SECRECY
1. Cyberthreat—satellite networks. AviationWeek.Com’s Frank Morring Jr. reports, “The proliferation of cyberthreats to communication networks has presented satellite operators with new challenges in protecting customer data against threats ranging from ‘hactivists’ and con men to state-sponsored snoops. . . . ‘When you combine satellite and terrestrial, you are actually magnifying the threat vectors exponentially’ . . . .”
2. Outside the Box: Navy’s solar energy genius. Wired.Com’s Allen McDuffee reports, “For decades, the Pentagon has been the world’s largest oil consumer, and as global petroleum prices continue to rise, the military has been searching for feasible energy alternatives. Now they’re looking in space. The U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) is building technology that will allow the military to capture solar power in orbit and project it back down to Earth. Not only would space solar potentially save the Pentagon buckets of cash, but it could simplify military deployments. Fuel tankers would no longer have to reach remote or volatile areas, and missions could run longer without having to return to base to refuel.”
3. Metadata, metadetails, metaproblems. VentureBeat.Com’s Barry Levine reports, “Information about the logistics of phone calls — metadata — may lead to personally sensitive details. The U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) and others have essentially said ‘it’s only metadata,’ but a new study from Stanford University’s Security Lab disagrees. . . . Keep in mind three major differences between this study and the NSA. First, participants knew they were being watched. Second, the NSA has access to system-level metadata from hubs at phone and Internet companies, not just device logs and public social media. Third, the NSA has the world’s most sophisticated computer systems.”
POTOMAC TWO-STEP
1. The alternative: “As House Speaker John Boehner brands Republicans as the party of alternatives, GOP pollsters tell TIME that the party of ‘Hell, No!’ isn’t going away any time soon as this year’s midterm elections draw nearer.”
2. Got your back: “Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin, D-Ill., threw his support Sunday behind Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein’s claim that the CIA might have spied on Senate staff. ‘Dianne Feinstein believes that’s the case—I’ll stand behind her,’ Durbin said of the California Democrat, though he also called for an investigation to ‘get to the bottom’ of the allegations.”
OPINIONS EVERYONE HAS
1. “To punish Putin, help Ukraine.” Reuters contributor Steven Pifer argues, “The best revenge against Moscow is to help the Ukrainian state succeed. That is, to put Ukraine on a firm path to a growing economy with stable democratic institutions.”
2. “The real West-Russia contest over Ukraine.” Christian Science Monitor’s Editorial Board argues, “As the West and Russia now use their respective tools of power in a contest over Ukraine, it is important to remember what’s really at stake. It is not over territory, Russian civilization, or a naval base on the Black Sea. Rather, it is the idea that individuals can be free and capable to determine their identity in concert with others.”
3. “How Women Are Reshaping the Defense Industry.” Time contributor Representative Kay Granger argues, “Women currently hold a little over four percent of the Fortune 500 CEO positions. However, in the defense industry, women are at the helm of 50 percent of the largest firms. Although women are hardly new to the industry, they are moving rapidly into the top jobs, and in the process melting away the defense industry’s male-dominated image.”
THE FUNNIES
3. The bracket.
