Homeland Security and Information Architecture

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Homeland Security and Information Architecture
Montreal, P.Q., Canada 04 March 2005

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A Special Presentation by
Lee S. Strickland, J.D. Director, Center for
Information Policy, and Professor University of
Maryland

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Pesky Legal Notices

• Non-governmental photographs are public domain or
  within 17 USC 107 (fair use) and 110
  (non-profit, educational purpose)
• This discussion should not be considered legal or
  technical advice
• The statements and opinions expressed here are
  mine and reflect neither the positions nor
  judgments of the United States Government or the
  University of Maryland.

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Our objectives today

• To briefly consider IA, the relationship to the
  FEA, and the surprise of 9/11

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today

• To consider informational vice organizational
  changes in order to secure our homeland

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today

• To examine in some detail the five pillars of
  homeland security today
• Create well-defined information architectures
• Effect informed, collaborative horizontal
  and vertical
  sharing
• Invest in human analysis and operations
• Introduce effective information analysis
  training and
  exploitation tools
• Introduce effective information warfare
  strategies.

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today

• Lastly, to understand the distinction between
  intelligence judgments
  and policy decisions
  in a
  democracy
• The NIE, the Presidentand the future of Iraq
• The WMD question.

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IA and HS

• Although definitions and concepts abound, IA is
  the structural design and specification of
  information in a given environment
• Critical to allow for use directly by an
  organization and for multi-nodal sharing
• Equally critical to permit effective analysis and
  the development of knowledge
• In other words, IA is the pillar of homeland
  security.

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ia and hs

• IA and the Federal Enterprise Architecture (FEA)
  

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ia and hs

• What is the FEA?
• A map connecting an organizations business
  functions with its information assets and
  systems
• Typically existing in as is and to be forms
• Why is it needed?
• To plan systems and make investments with maximum
  efficiency and support the business needs
• Without, we have disparate and non-integrated
  solutions that dont put the right information in
  the right hands at the right time.

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ia and hs

• The FEA models
• Business model defines how an agency performs its
  functions
• Performance model sets measurements for that
  performance (focus less on outputs and more on
  outcomes)
• Data model specifies the information used to
  execute the functions
• Service model defines the applications used to
  perform the functions
• Technical model defines the standards used to
  represent the data and build the applications.

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ia and hs

• The events of 9/11
• The National Commission report a surprise, lack
  of imagination or more?
• The documented extent of knowledge about aircraft
  as weapons of war and other missed key
  indicators
• In the judgment of many, a failure of information
  architecture and hence knowledge management.

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ia and hs

• The events of 9/11 (continued)
• And perhaps most significantly, a failure to
  mobilize the bureaucracy in general and a failure
  of the warning intelligence process in
  particular
• The lost skill of ACH
• Developing hypotheses as to surprise attack
  vectors
• Identifying key indicators
• Tasking to collect against those indicators
• Developing mitigation or defense strategies
• Having an IA that ensures the necessary
  synchronous information flow.

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Information vs. Organization Change

• An overview of the 9/11 Commission recommendation
  and legislative enactments
• The needs and the dangers
• Efficiency in the intelligence process
• Addressing root causes of failures with surgical
  precision
• Increasing resources
• The risk of politicizing the intelligence process

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change

• Key 9/11 Commission recommendations
• Develop a global counter-terrorism strategy
• 4 recommendations to identify sanctuaries and
  refocus efforts on Pakistan, Afghanistan, and
  Saudi Arabia
• Prevent continued growth of Islamic terrorism
• 9 recommendations to use communications,
  collaborative relationships with other countries,
  and economics to win the battle of ideas in the
  Middle East

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change

• Key 9/11 Commission recommendations (cont)
• Protect against future homeland attacks
• 8 recommendations that target travel, including
  enhanced use of information screening systems
  such as biometrics
• 3 recommendations to protect civil liberties
• 4 recommendations that improve preparedness,
  including conducting risk assessments and
  improving communications interoperability

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change

• Key 9/11 Commission recommendations (cont)
• Reorganize the government
• 5 recommendations that would establish a national
  director of intelligence, specialized
  intelligence centers, rebuild core capabilities
  in the CIA and move paramilitary operations to
  the Department of Defense
• Enhance information sharing
• 2 recommendations to better balance security and
  sharing

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change

• Key 9/11 Commission recommendations (cont)
• Improve congressional oversight of intelligence
• 3 recommendations that would focus oversight in
  many fewer committees
• Refocus the domestic security apparatus
• 3 recommendations to enhance the intelligence
  function and analysis in particular at the FBI
  and to require regular assessments by the
  Department of Defense and the Department of
  Homeland Security as to threats and adequacy of
  defensive plans.

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5 Pillars of Homeland Security

• Resolve the dysfunctional information space
  within agencies
• Stovepipes in general including budgetary and
  compartmentation factors
• Trilogy and other examples.
• Empower and re-engineer sharing among the
  agencies
• Horizontal and vertical the Markle Foundation
  Report
• Information management not technology
• JNET example
• EO and legislative initiatives

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pillars

• Knowledge sharing from the humor perspective

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pillars

• Invest in human operations and analysis
• DCI Tenet set the requirements minimum 5 year
  investment plan
• Intelligence reorganization legislation calls for
  50 increase a daunting challenge.
• Introduce effective information analysis training
  and exploitation tools
• Intelligence is not law enforcement new training
  and paradigms are required
• A short history of intelligence analysis
• Progress to date.

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pillars

• Introduce effective information warfare
  techniques
• We face an asymmetric, networked enemy that
  requires new tools, foci and strategies
• Multi-channeled network, not chain (hierarchal)
  or star (hub)
• Active attacks via the Internet to disrupt
• Passive attacks to gather intelligence as to
  communities
• Make cooperation too costly
• Support indigenous opponents
• Use historical disruption techniques
• Weaken the terrorist appeal through
  communications and education
• Effectively use information to safeguard the
  nations borders.

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Intelligence vs. Policy

• The recurring demand for actionable
  intelligence
• Puzzles vs. mysteries
• Analysts are estimators, they can inform as to
  threats and vulnerabilities, but they are not
  clairvoyants
• Today, our society tends to confuse
  nuanced intelligence judgments that
  offer estimates in
  probabilities with
  political decisions that are
  inherently definitive.

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A Quick Postscript

• Homeland security and civil liberties so often
  appear in conflict rather we need to engineer
  both in our technical solutions
• Otherwise, history demonstrates
  that the solutions will fail or
  our rights will be diminished
• TIA
• CAPPS II

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postscript

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Questions?

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Want to know more?

• Lee S. Strickland, J.D.
• LSTRICKL_at_deans.umd.edu
• 301-405-1741