FedMentor: DOC’s Rod Turk

http://youtu.be/EVS7RVW_s_0
Rod Turk, chief information security officer at the Commerce Department, discusses his early career with FedScoopTV.

FedScoopTV: World War II vets to get nation’s first wireless memorial

As the 10-year anniversary of the opening of the World War II Memorial approaches this weekend, the monument and the American Battle Monuments Commission have another milestone to add to the celebration – the first monument on the National Mall to go wireless.

FedScoop’s Editorial Director, Dan Verton, got a look at the new information kiosks recently installed at the memorial by McLean, Virginia-based INADEV Corp. If funding is approved for the second phase of implementation, the kiosks and the databases that power them will extend to visitors’ mobile devices. A mobile app is currently being planned.

Is USPS standing in the way of a modern postal system?

The U.S. Postal Service is tens of billions of dollars in debt and continues to lose billions despite cost-cutting measures. And while many point to a significant decline in first class mail and other revenues as the main reason behind USPS’ financial woes, the government-backed mail carrier may also be suffering from an identity crisis that is hurting its ability innovate.

The question about whether USPS is a federal agency or a business and the negative impact that uncertainty is increasingly having on USPS’ ability to engage private sector businesses in innovative partnerships were at the heart of a hearing Thursday held by the House Committee on Oversight & Government Reform’s Subcommittee on Federal Workforce, U.S. Postal Service and the Census.

Billed as an examination into “innovative postal products for the 21st Century,” the hearing quickly became more about whether or not USPS is impeding its own progress.

Will Davis, CEO of Outbox, Inc., told the committee of his frustrations with the postal service and the difficult nature of what will need to happen for the agency to innovate. He did so by paying homage to the 1987 cult-classic film “The Princess Bride.”

“There’s a scene in there where Inigo Montoya is caught up with a band of criminals, and there’s a criminal mastermind, and he keeps using the word ‘inconceivable,’ ‘inconceivable,’ when all of his plans don’t go as planned,” Davis said. “Montoya looks at him and he says, ‘You keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means.’ That’s a little bit how I feel today about the word innovation. I don’t think that it means what [the government and USPS] think it means.”

Outbox, which shut down four months ago, was a mail operation that allowed customers to screen their mail digitally and decide which physical pieces they wanted delivered.

A lack of cooperation on the part of USPS, Davis said, was one of the main reasons behind the company’s demise.

Davis and his business partner, Evan Baehr, recently met with Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe to talk about the results of an early test with USPS. In the meeting, according to the farewell letter posted on Outbox’s website, Donahoe and the senior leadership of USPS said they would “never participate in any project that would limit junk mail.” After the meeting, the early test partnership between USPS and Outbox was terminated.

Technology like Outbox is used successfully internationally. The ranking member of the subcommittee, Rep. Stephen Lynch, D-Mass., said similar screening systems are used in Switzerland.

“I think [that technology like Switzerland’s] is going to be coming to the United States at some point,” Lynch said. “That is really disruptive. It’d be a great thing for the environment because of the huge drop in mail volume because people won’t be getting mail that they don’t want. That’ll be a terrible thing for the United States Postal Service national letter carriers, it’ll drop in volume, but that’s really disruptive change. That’s what we’re going to have to deal with at some point.”

Lynch used the hearing and discussion of innovation to criticize House Oversight & Government Reform Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., who spearheaded efforts to push a small-scale postal reform bill through the committee after a markup yesterday.

The bill would require the Postal Service to move approximately 1.5 million addresses a year during the next decade from home delivery service to a centralized delivery system. By doing so, USPS could save more than $2 million per year, according to a statement by the committee.

“[Issa’s proposal] is disruptive in a way,” Lynch said. “But that’s not innovation, that’s a Luddite idea. That is going backward in time. That’s not creative. That’s extremely costly and inefficient and it reduces our flexibility in terms of what we’re doing next.”

James Cochrane, USPS’ chief information officer, said that the concept of collecting and digitizing mail, like Outbox, has been around for almost a decade. But the concept is not the problem, he said.

“The challenge was that Outbox approached it a little differently,” Cochrane said. “They didn’t want to have a commercial mail receiving agency, so that required them to go to the mailbox and pick it up. But there are companies out there sustaining that business model.”

Rep. William Lacy Clay, D-Mo., said the hearing was not the place to criticize the postal service for not innovating, due to the business-minded concerns that arise with some innovations like Outbox.

“I think it’s unfair to use this hearing to criticize the postal service for not being innovative and at the same time insist that it operate with a business mindset,” Clay said.

In a moment of bipartisan surprise, Clay and Issa agreed.

“Although it’s a shame to see a for-profit entity close because they’re not making a profit, I do agree with you that this is an innovation that should be on the list of innovations for the postal service because it falls squarely within their basic requirement,” Issa said.

Issa said he sees advantages to public-private partnerships between USPS and private entities, but in the case of technology like Outbox, the postal service should own it outright, he said.

“When [Lynch] talks about digital delivery in Switzerland being inevitable, he talks about a version of Mr. Davis’ business plan that Switzerland has gotten ahead of us on,” Issa said. “He’s absolutely right. These innovations are either going to happen within the postal system, or the postal system is going to miss it all together and then be fighting for its core right not to participate with a business that may already have gone a long way.”

From resistance to denial

Davis’ company was not the only company that was slowed down by resistance from the postal service. Patrick Eidemiller, the director of engineering and technology for M-pack Systems, said resistance from the post office has slowed, and perhaps even stopped, a potential redesign in how pharmaceuticals are shipped through the post office.

M-pack is a flat pharmacy vial, compared to the classic brown vial that prescription drugs traditionally come in. The company also outfitted the vial with a tamper-evident seal.

“We have more security. We also have a lot more label space; it’s more space efficient, more compact,” Eidemiller said. “Flat has another advantage — the USPS provides a favorable rate for what’s called a machinable flat.”

To mail the classic brown vial currently in use, USPS requires that it be mailed as a parcel for $2.22. With M-pack’s redesign, the vial would theoretically be mailed as a machinable flat for $1.56 — a 29 percent savings.

The problem, Eidemiller said, is USPS will not accept the redesigned package as a machinable flat, even after approving it once already.

“This envelope meets all of the mechanical requirements of this machinable flat; we tested it on the Siemens test equipment in Fort Worth and verified that it worked. We received our approval on June 17, 2011,” Eidemiller said.

Even after a redesign reportedly made the package lighter, smaller and cheaper, USPS ultimately denied both the original and the updated package as a machinable flat, according to Eidemiller.

“Our packages were rejected,” Eidemiller said. “We were shocked — this had been approved once for a completely different reason. It was not the fact that it does not meet the mechanical requirements of a machinable flat. It was that a box in an envelope is not a machinable flat.”

M-pack attempted to work with the post office to make the packaging qualify, but the attempts were unsuccessful. So the company took the packaging to the private sector, to one of USPS’ largest competitors — the United Parcel Service.

“They said, ‘You know what, we’ll take it,’” Eidemiller said. “No questions asked.”

Despite both Davis and Eidemiller’s frustrations with USPS, Seth Weisberg, the chief legal officer for stamps.com, and Todd Everett of Newgistics, Inc., both testified that their companies have forged lasting and productive relationships with USPS.

In the case of stamps.com, the service allows customers to purchase and print U.S. postage from their own computers and printers. Newgistics, Inc. is the top provider for USPS’ Parcel Return Services.

USPS CIO Cochrane acknowledged the problems associated with the agency’s financial deficit, and said a comprehensive congressional reform of the postal service was necessary. But reform must include granting the postal service more authority to make business decisions without the approval of Congress, he said.

USPS reported a $2.2 billion year-to-date loss earlier this month. The independent government agency does not receive any taxpayer money and is sustained by revenues from shipping and stamps.

FedWire: NASA web-connected telescopes, facial recognition talks and virtual Army training

FedWire is FedScoop’s afternoon roundup of news and notes from the federal IT community. Send your links and videos to tips@fedscoop.com.

NASA gets web-connected telescopes.

NTIA talks facial recognition.

Virtual training for Army combat construction.

Secretary Hagel backs tough DOD budget.

HHS funds two new innovative health care initiatives.

FDA targets illegal online pharmacies.

Better Buildings initiative saves $730 million.

FTC against innovation-stinting patent demand letters.

Freedom Act passes House despite changes, loss of support

The House passed a bill Thursday to limit the National Security Agency’s surveillance activities by an overwhelming margin.

Though several important backers of the USA Freedom Act pulled their support, the House passed the Freedom Act, 303-121. The bill now faces the Senate, where some lawmakers have expressed concern about the removal of certain reforms in the final House version.

While some privacy advocates and lawmakers argue the bill does not go far enough to curtail mass surveillance, the Freedom Act still prohibits bulk collection of telephone metadata and requires the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to approve any requests for phone records from telecommunications firms.

“What is being considered is not the bill that was marked up by the House Judiciary Committee,” said Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., speaking on the House floor. “Certain key elements of this bill were changed. I think it’s ironic that a bill that was intended to increase transparency was secretly changed between the Committee markup and floor consideration.”

Among the most controversial changes to the bill’s language was a broadening of the definition of who or what NSA is allowed to monitor. The original version of the bill said the government could force telecommunications companies to hand over records based on search terms that “uniquely describe a person, entity or account.” But that language was changed to include the phrase “such as” — expanding NSA’s search authority to “a discrete term, such as a term specifically identifying a person, entity, account, address, or device.”

The Reform Government Surveillance coalition — a group of powerhouse tech companies, including Facebook, Google and Apple — pulled its support for the bill, citing in a statement that the House changes have moved it “in the wrong direction.”

“While it makes important progress, we cannot support this bill as currently drafted and urge Congress to close this loophole to ensure meaningful reform,” the group said.

The Electric Frontier Foundation said the House “gutted” the bill.

“Earlier today, House Leadership reached an agreement to amend the bipartisan USA FREEDOM Act in ways that severely weaken the bill, potentially allowing bulk surveillance of records to continue,” EFF wrote in a blog post Tuesday. “The Electronic Frontier Foundation cannot support a bill that doesn’t achieve the goal of ending mass spying. We urge Congress to support uncompromising NSA reform and we look forward to working on the Senate’s bipartisan version of the USA FREEDOM Act.”

Disapproval for the bill is far from universal, though, made obvious by its huge margin of victory Thursday and more than 150 co-sponsors.

The White House gave its approval of the current bill Wednesday, which could have something to do with its changes. Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., the sponsor of the bill, said it took intense negotiations to get the president and the administration on board, but eventually they compromised. Should the bill pass the Senate, President Obama is likely to sign it into law.

But the bill faces challenges in the Senate.

Thursday before House voting, even Sensenbrenner said it wasn’t perfect, but that shouldn’t be reason for killing it.

“Perfect is rarely possible in politics, and this bill is no exception,” he said. “Let me be clear, I wish this bill did more. To my colleagues who lament changes, I agree with you. To privacy groups who are upset about lost provisions, I share your disappointment. But this bill still deserves support. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.”

Threat Matrix Exclusive: NSA’s John DeLong on privacy compliance

The National Security Agency this week granted FedScoop an exclusive interview with John DeLong, the agency’s director of compliance. I sat down with DeLong at the National Cryptologic Museum across from NSA headquarters, and he agreed to a wide-ranging discussion of what his office does at NSA and the lengths to which NSA goes to ensure it operates within the confines of the law.

DeLong oversees a staff of 300 and manages his own budget authority focused solely on compliance. Throughout our discussion, he describes the different components of NSA’s compliance program and some of the latest research efforts that may one day produce new, privacy-ready technologies.

This week on the Threat Matrix: John DeLong, director of compliance for the National Security Agency.

Part 2: Snowden and changes at NSA

DARPA showcases IT projects at Pentagon

The Pentagon transformed its center courtyard Wednesday into an adult science fair, as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency showcased more than 100 of its latest projects as part of DARPA Demo Day 2014.

It wasn’t DARPA’s first demo day, but it was the first hosted by the agency’s Information Innovation Office — and in the middle of the Pentagon courtyard, no less. Rick Weiss, director of public affairs at DARPA, said the event was successful because of its ability to connect the researchers and developers behind groundbreaking technologies with the very defense personnel who may one day use them.

“The idea is both to let Defense Department folks — mostly science and technology folks — know about some of the areas that DARPA is working on that are relevant to their mission and to hear feedback from them as well, in terms of what their needs are on the ground and how some of what we’re developing could be useful to them in ways that maybe we have not anticipated,” Weiss said.

Though it wasn’t open to the public or industry members other than the project developers, Weiss said the demo day looked and felt like a packed festival.

Because DARPA’s I2O hosted the event, there was a heavy emphasis on cyber technologies, big data, language translation and software.

“The information revolution has been a huge boon to society, but our growing dependence on information networks also means that information is today’s tactical and strategic high ground, increasingly targeted by adversaries from everyday criminals to networked terrorists who would do our nation mortal harm,” said DARPA I2O Director Dan Kaufman in a statement. “I2O’s mission is to ensure the safety and reliability of essential information technologies, against the challenges we face today and also against those we can imagine well into the future.”

Active authentication projects had a strong showing at the event, according to Weiss. He described the developing technology as “ways your computer or cell phone would know you are you without having to punch in a password every time you want to get started.” For instance, he referenced devices using accelerometers to learn the way someone walks to identify them.

Big data was also a big hit. DARPA placed heavy emphasis on a project called Mining and Understanding Software Enclaves, or MUSE, “which is seeking to organize all of the open source data in the world in a way that could help people who are writing software not have to start from scratch each time they start,” Weiss said.

And though most of the innovative projects came directly from the Information Innovation Office, some technology from other DARPA offices made appearances as well, like the new DEKA prosthetic arm.

“It’s one of the fastest moving fields in defense R&D, just because information is becoming such an essential element both in offensive and defensive capabilities,” Weiss said. “So it’s a huge area of particular interest right now within the DOD community.”

Despite hacking, US to continue pursuing military relations with China

A day after the Justice Department charged five Chinese military officers with cyber-espionage, the Defense Department said Tuesday it will continue pursuing military relations with China.

Attorney General Eric Holder released indictments Monday accusing five officers in Unit 61398 of the Third Department of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army with hacking into the networks of six U.S. companies and stealing trade secrets. It is the first time the U.S. has officially charged active members of the PLA with cybercrimes stemming from economic espionage activities.

Between 2006 and 2014, the accused — Wang Dong, Sun Kailiang, Wen Xinyu, Huang Zhenyu and Gu Chunhui — allegedly broke into the networks of Westinghouse Electric Co.; U.S. subsidiaries of SolarWorld AG; United States Steel Corp.; Allegheny Technologies Inc.; the United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union; and Alcoa Inc. to steal proprietary and confidential information.

The alleged actions of those five men, though, did not deter the Pentagon from pursuing better military relations with the PLA.

“We still desire, from a military perspective, to further grow and develop the military-to-military relationship and to find ways to have a more productive conversation about these very tough issues,” Pentagon Press Secretary Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby said. “Cyber’s one of them.”

These alleged crimes will likely lead to trust issues between the two countries’ militaries, but Kirby said that gives DOD more incentive to improve communication with China. In fact, though Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel hasn’t yet spoken to his Chinese counterpart about the issue, the Pentagon is leaving it up to the PLA to determine the future state of relations between the two militaries.

“The degree to which it affects our military relationship is largely up to them, and their conduct and their behavior,” Kirby said. “We still believe that it’s an important relationship to have; we still want to keep the lines of communication open.”

The Chinese aren’t reacting so amicably, though, having already pulled their involvement from the China-U.S. Cyber Working Group yesterday in protest.

“Given the lack of sincerity on the part of the U.S. to solve issues related to cyber security through dialogue and cooperation, China has decided to suspend activities of the China-U.S. Cyber Working Group,” said Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang.

China’s Ambassador to the United States, Cui Tiankai, said, “The accusations that the United States have made against these Chinese officials are purely fictitious and extremely absurd,” according to Reuters.

Despite the tension, Kirby said DOD wants to keep communication on cyber open and transparent with the Chinese and work at redeveloping a mutual trust.

FedWire: FCC chairman on Net Neutrality, DOD missile defense test and Energy’s $10M investment in solar

FedWire is FedScoop’s afternoon roundup of news and notes from the federal IT community. Send your links and videos to tips@fedscoop.com.

FCC chairman testifies on Net Neutrality.

Less antitrust deals reported in 2013.

OPM claims success in first Obamacare enrollment.

Interior takes over White House Instagram.

DOD conducts successful test of Aegis Ashore missile defense system.

Energy commits $10 million to solar projects.

Challenges protecting federal facilities.

DOT approves data-transmission standard.

Experts urge Congress to streamline homeland security oversight

More than 60 national security experts, including all three former secretaries of homeland security, signed a petition Wednesday calling on Congress to reduce the number of committees with homeland security oversight responsibilities.

Published as a paid advertisement in The Wall Street Journal, the petition argued “the nation is not as secure as it could be” because of the political paralysis resulting from “a tangle of overlapping committees.”

The Department of Homeland Security currently answers to more than 100 congressional committees, subcommittees and other groups that claim oversight responsibilities for the department and its activities.

Reforming congressional oversight of homeland security and reducing the number of committees DHS must answer to was one of the key recommendations of the 9/11 Commission report, issued in 2004. But it is also one of the few recommendations yet to be acted upon by Congress.

By leaving the current oversight structure in place, Congress makes “our nation vulnerable to cyberthreats, biohazards and small boats and planes carrying unknown cargo,” the petition states.

Ronald Marks, a former CIA officer who currently serves as a senior fellow with the Homeland Security Policy Institute at George Washington University, applauded the effort to bring attention to the issue of reforming the congressional oversight structure of homeland security issues.

“There are too many to make for effective oversight of a such a large executive department,” Marks said in an email to FedScoop. “That being said, only the leadership of the Congress can take action to begin the debate over the structure of congressional oversight. Power is not ceded willingly on the Hill. Whoever is removed as oversight will need to be placated in some way. And, facing an election year, it is doubtful the leadership will do much in this session of Congress.”

In a video posted on the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania’s website, former 9/11 Commission Co-Chairman Tom Kean said every recommendation made by the commission is tied to a failure that helped cause the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

“So it’s frustrating. It’s frustrating to every single one of us on the commission that this outstanding recommendation is the one that still hasn’t been done,” Kean said.

Caryn Wagner, a signatory to the petition who served as undersecretary for intelligence and analysis at DHS from 2010 to 2012, called the oversight structure in Congress “a huge problem” for DHS.

“Because all of the components of the department existed before [DHS was formed], they had committees of jurisdiction and oversight before,” Wagner said. “And in some cases there’s long histories of committees overseeing parts of the department. They did not want to give that up.”

This paid advertisement appeared in The Wall Street Journal on May 21, 2014, calling on Congress to reduce the number of committees with oversight responsibilities for the Department of Homeland Security.