News

The Nationwide Network Working to Bring Mobile Biometrics to Your Community

A federal law passed in February 2012 to help middle class families by creating jobs and cutting payroll taxes included a section mandating the creation of a nationwide interoperable broadband communications system for law enforcement and first responders. The system, which is being created under the direction of the First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet), seeks to create a nationwide broadband network capable of being used for a variety of law enforcement purposes including remote surveillance, mobile biometric applications like field fingerprint scanning and facial recognition, as well as automated license plate reading. The system is currently in a pilot phase with less than a dozen locations around the country participating in the initial rollout of the FirstNet network. However, comments from FirstNet board members indicate that the future goals of the system include an interoperable network operating in all 56 states and territories of the U.S. that is capable of integration at the state, local and federal level.

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New York

(U//FOUO) New York State Department of Health Superstorm Sandy Response After Action Report

Superstorm Sandy, a late-season post-tropical cyclone and the tenth storm of the 2012 Atlantic hurricane season, swept through the Caribbean and up the East Coast of the United States in late October 2012. The storm left 42 dead in New York State (NYS), thousands homeless and millions without power. Superstorm Sandy began as a tropical wave in the Caribbean on October 19, 2012. It quickly developed into a tropical depression and then a tropical storm in six hours. It quickly moved north, then turned northwest within the next week, making landfall on October 29, 2012 striking near Atlantic City, New Jersey with winds of 80 miles per hour. At one point, Superstorm Sandy’s hurricane force winds (74 mph) extended up to 175 miles from its center and tropical storm force winds (39 mph) out to 485 miles. A full moon made high tides 20 percent higher than normal, amplifying Superstorm Sandy’s storm surge.

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California, Intelligence Fusion Centers

City of Oakland Domain Awareness Center Emails

Hundreds of emails from the City of Oakland relating to the construction of the City/Port of Oakland Joint Domain Awareness Center. The files were scanned from printouts held in a series of folders by the City of Oakland and were obtained via a public records request made by members of Occupy Oakland. The emails were the source material for a recent story in the East Bay Express by Darwin BondGraham stating that the City of Oakland had allowed the Domain Awareness Center’s prime contractor Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) to perjure themselves by signing a disclosure form claiming that the company was in compliance with the city’s Nuclear Weapons Free Zone Ordinance which prohibits the city from doing business with contractors that are connected to the production or use of nuclear weapons. According to the article, SAIC has had a number of contracts relating to nuclear weapons for more than a decade, including a May 2013 U.S. Navy contact for “engineering services, testing, and integration for nuclear command control and communication (NC3) messaging systems.”

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U.S. Army

Restricted U.S. Army Psychological Operations Officer Training Manual

The mission of Psychological Operations is to influence the behavior of foreign target audiences (TAs) to support United States (U.S.) national objectives. Psychological Operations(PSYOP) are planned operations to convey selected information and indicators to foreign audiences to influence the emotions, motives, objective reasoning, and ultimately the behavior of foreign governments, organizations, groups, and individuals (JP 3-53, Joint Doctrine for Joint Psychological Operations). Behavioral change is at the root of the PSYOP mission. Although concerned with the mental process of foreign TAs, it is the observable modification of foreign TA behavior that determines the mission success of PSYOP. It is this link between influence and behavior that distinguished PSYOP from other capabilities and activities of information operations (IO) and related components such as public affairs.

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U.S. Army

Restricted U.S. Army Psychological Operations Specialist Training Guide

This Soldier training publication (STP) is for Skill Levels 1 through 4 Soldiers holding the military occupational specialty (MOS) 37F, Psychological Operations Specialist. It contains standardized training objectives in the form of task summaries to train critical tasks that support unit missions. All Soldiers holding MOS 37F should have access to this publication. This publication applies to the Active Army, the Army National Guard (ARNG)/Army National Guard of the United States (ARNGUS), and the United States Army Reserve (USAR) unless otherwise stated.

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Intelligence Fusion Centers, New Jersey

(U//FOUO) New Jersey Fusion Center Active Shooter Awareness for the 2013 Holiday Season

One of the most serious threats facing New Jersey and the entire U.S. Homeland continues to be that of the active shooter, regardless of motivation, who by the very nature of their associated tactics, techniques, and procedures, pose a serious challenge to security personnel based on their ability to operate independently, making them extremely difficult to detect and disrupt before conducting an attack.

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Bank of International Settlements, European Central Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, World Bank

Financial Stability Board Global Shadow Banking Monitoring Report 2013

The shadow banking system can broadly be described as credit intermediation involving entities and activities outside the regular banking system. Intermediating credit through non-bank channels can have important advantages and contributes to the financing of the real economy, but such channels can also become a source of systemic risk, especially when they are structured to perform bank-like functions (e.g. maturity transformation and leverage) and when their interconnectedness with the regular banking system is strong. Therefore, appropriate monitoring of shadow banking helps to mitigate the build-up of such systemic risks. The FSB set out its approach for monitoring the global shadow banking system in its report to the G20 in October 2011. This report presents the results of the third annual monitoring exercise following this approach, using end-2012 data. The report includes data from 25 jurisdictions and the euro area as a whole, bringing the coverage of the monitoring exercise to about 80% of global GDP and 90% of global financial system assets.

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Intelligence Fusion Centers, New Jersey

(U//FOUO) New Jersey Fusion Center Mass Shootings Commonalities December 2012-October 2013

The New Jersey Regional Operations Intelligence Center (NJ ROIC) provides the following updated analysis of mass shootings in the last year (December 2012 to October 2013) in order to provide law enforcement personnel, security managers and emergency personnel with identified commonalities and trends, as well as indicators of potential violence.

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Department of Homeland Security

DHS National Incident Management System: Intelligence/Investigations Function Guidance and Field Operations Guide

This document includes guidance on how various disciplines can use and integrate the I/I Function while adhering to NIMS concepts and principles. It includes information intended for the NIMS practitioner (including the Incident Commander/Unified Command [IC/UC]) that assists in the placement of the I/I Function within the command structure; provides guidance that may be used while implementing the I/I Function; and has an accompanying Intelligence/ Investigations Function Field Operations Guide (I/I FFOG). While this document provides an example of the I/I Function at the Section level, the IC/UC has the final determination of the scope and placement of the I/I Function within the command structure. The guidance provided in this document is applicable for both domestic incidents that use conventional unclassified information (e.g., open source information, criminal histories, medical records, or educational records) and terrorism incidents where information is often classified and requires the use of national intelligence capabilities.

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Connecticut

Connecticut State’s Attorney Report on Sandy Hook Elementary School Mass Shooting

The purpose of this report is to identify the person or persons criminally responsible for the twenty-seven homicides that occurred in Newtown, Connecticut, on the morning of December 14, 2012, to determine what crimes were committed, and to indicate if there will be any state prosecutions as a result of the incident. Since December 14, 2012, the Connecticut State Police and the State’s Attorney’s Office have worked with the federal authorities sharing responsibilities for various aspects of this investigation. Numerous other municipal, state and federal agencies assisted in the investigation. The investigation materials reflect thousands of law enforcement and prosecutor hours. Apart from physical evidence, the materials consist of more than seven-hundred individual files that include reports, statements, interviews, videos, laboratory tests and results, photographs, diagrams, search warrants and returns, as well as evaluations of those items.

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Department of Transportation, U.S. Air Force

Department of Transportation Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) Service Demand 2015-2035

This report assesses opportunities, risks, and challenges attendant to future development and deployment of UAS within the National Airspace System (NAS) affecting UAS forecast growth from 2015 to 2035. Analysis of four key areas is performed: technology, mission needs, economics, and existing or anticipated challenges to routine use in NAS operations. Forecast effects of emerging technologies as well as anticipating new technological innovations in areas of airframes, powerplants, sensors, communication, command and control systems, and information technology and processing are evaluated. Anticipated mission needs include intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR), as well as new areas such as stores delivery, cargo transport, search and rescue, and pilot augmentation; example business case models are developed for each of these areas. Challenges to routine UAS usage in the NAS include: absence of legislation and regulations for safe flight in integrated airspace; pilot training and certification; regulatory, policy, and procedural issues; social issues, such as privacy and nuisance concerns; environmental issues, such as noise and emissions; and safety.

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California

San Francisco Bay Area Regional Interoperable Communications Systems Authority (BayRICS) Facial Recognition Presentation

A presentation presenting an overview of the Bay Area Regional Interoperable Communications System Authority (BayRICS), a 13-member Joint Powers Authority (JPA) serving the San Francisco Bay Area, established in August 2011. The presentation lists license plate readers, facial recognition and field fingerprint scanning as potential uses of the BayRICS network.

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Department of Homeland Security

(U//FOUO) DHS National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center (NCCIC) Capabilities Guide

The National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center (NCCIC) Resource and Capabilities Guide is intended to enhance cross-sector cyber security efforts and collaboration by better informing our cybersecurity and communications partners of the NCCIC’s tools, assets, and collaboration mechanisms offered. This guide also identifies the Center’s resources and capabilities as well as describes the processes for accessing NCCIC information portals and products, incident reporting systems, and relevant point of contact information for our community of partners.

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Department of Homeland Security

DHS National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center Bulletin: Destructive Malware

As related to malware which may exhibit a potentially destructive capability, organizations should increase vigilance and evaluate their capabilities encompassing planning, preparation, detection, and response for such an event. Destructive malware presents a direct threat to an organization’s daily operations, directly impacting the availability of critical assets and data. In addition, the response required for such an event can be extremely resource intensive.

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Department of Homeland Security

DHS National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center Bulletin: Cryptolocker Ransomware

The following product is a coordinated effort between NCCIC, U.S. Secret Service and The Cyber Intelligence Network (CIN), provided to assist in prevention, detection and mitigation of a new ransomeware campaign. Ransomware is malware that restricts access to infected computers and requires victims to pay a ransom in order to regain full access. Cryptolocker is particularly interesting in that it functions by encrypting victims computer files with a combination of RSA-2048 and AES-256 encryption. Once encrypted, victims are provided a window of time in which they can pay the actors to receive the key needed to decrypt their files.

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California, Corporate, Intelligence Fusion Centers

Oakland Domain Awareness Center Purchasing Invoices March-July 2013

Scans of all invoices related to the City of Oakland’s contract with Science Applications International Corporation for the construction of the City/Port of Oakland Joint Domain Awareness Center. The documents were collected in a binder held by the City of Oakland and obtained via a public records request made by members of Occupy Oakland. The invoices are organized by month and range in date from March to July 2013.

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News

Joint Chiefs of Staff Instruction Modifies Language on Collateral Damage Estimates for Drone Strikes

An updated instruction issued by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in October 2012 incorporates significantly modified language in numerous sections of the document that describe the process for estimating collateral damage prior to conducting drone strikes and other military actions. These subtle, but important changes in wording provide insight into the military’s attempts to limit expectations in regards to minimizing collateral damage and predicting the lethal effects of military operations.

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Government Accountability Office

GAO Report: TSA Should Limit Future Funding for Behavior Detection Activities

Available evidence does not support whether behavioral indicators, which are used in the Transportation Security Administration’s (TSA) Screening of Passengers by Observation Techniques (SPOT) program, can be used to identify persons who may pose a risk to aviation security. GAO reviewed four meta-analyses (reviews that analyze other studies and synthesize their findings) that included over 400 studies from the past 60 years and found that the human ability to accurately identify deceptive behavior based on behavioral indicators is the same as or slightly better than chance. Further, the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) April 2011 study conducted to validate SPOT’s behavioral indicators did not demonstrate their effectiveness because of study limitations, including the use of unreliable data. Twenty-one of the 25 behavior detection officers (BDO) GAO interviewed at four airports said that some behavioral indicators are subjective. TSA officials agree, and said they are working to better define them. GAO analyzed data from fiscal years 2011 and 2012 on the rates at which BDOs referred passengers for additional screening based on behavioral indicators and found that BDOs’ referral rates varied significantly across airports, raising questions about the use of behavioral indicators by BDOs. To help ensure consistency, TSA officials said they deployed teams nationally to verify compliance with SPOT procedures in August 2013. However, these teams are not designed to help ensure BDOs consistently interpret SPOT indicators.

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