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DHS Cybersecurity Security Review Board to Review Salt Typhoon Attack

Pabio October 30, 2024

The Department of Homeland Security’s Cyber Safety Review Board will investigate an alleged hack of U.S. telecommunications networks linked to China. DHS has confirmed that the board’s next review will examine intrusions related to the “Salt Typhoon” hacking group. The group allegedly targeted the communications of U.S. political figures as well as a wiretap system used by federal law enforcement. US agencies are already investigating these incidents. The Cyber Safety Review Board typically studies the circumstances that lead to major cyber incidents to learn lessons and make recommendations.
Going forward, the General Services Administration (GSA) will evaluate AbilityOne contractors under the Contractor Past Performance Reporting System, or C-PARS. Jeff Koses, GSA’s senior procurement officer, yesterday signed a waiver of federal acquisition regulations instituting this change. FAR said agencies should not evaluate the performance of contracts awarded under AbilityOne procedures. But Koses said that was an outdated concept and that including AbilityOne contractors in CPARS would give them more ability to compete and win contracts. The Department of Defense issued a similar FAR waiver in 2013. GSA spends more than $180 million annually with AbiltyOne contractors.
If you plan to vote by mail, the Postal Service (USPS) recommends that you return your ballot today. So far, the USPS has delivered almost all mail-in ballots on time. But he urges voters to return their ballots seven days after their election office is due to receive them. More than 44 million voters have already cast their ballots before Election Day. A little more than half of those early votes came from mail-in ballots.
Letter carrier groups are pushing for a “no” vote on their union’s tentative contract with the Postal Service. Letter carriers across the country have expressed frustration with the terms of a tentative contract negotiated by the National Association of Letter Carriers. The tentative agreement includes salary increases of 1.3% for each year of the three-year contract and semi-annual cost-of-living adjustments. NALC National President Brian Renfroe said the tentative agreement is the best deal possible. The USPS reported a net loss of $6.5 billion last year.
The Defense Information Systems Agency’s (DISA) next acquisition, called ModEl, or Modernization and Engineering Lifecycle Refresh, will focus on customer engineering, professional services, investment planning and telecommunications professional services. Although the agency is still understanding the scope of the project, the contract value for ModEl could be between $250 million and $1 billion. DISA’s J6 C4 will lead this effort. The agency plans to use a competitive team agreement – an approach that DISA has not often employed in the past. An industry day is planned for November 11, with the final RFP release date expected in the second quarter of fiscal 2025.
The Defense Information Systems Agency wants to focus on modernizing the cyber perimeter. The director of DISA’s Cybersecurity and Analysis Directorate says modernizing the cyber perimeter is one of the agency’s top areas of concern. “I’ve heard from people who I consider zero trust fanatics that they don’t believe there’s a reason for a cyber perimeter. They don’t see what we see every day. But even as the agency understands the threat, it lacks visibility into the latest technical solutions and capabilities that could strengthen perimeter defenses.
For the first time in years, two federal leadership councils are meeting. The Council of Human Capital Directors and the Performance Improvement Council will host a joint meeting on November 7 to discuss how the federal workforce can better support agency performance goals. Kirsty Daphnis, chief of the federal workforce branch at OMB, said the meeting will focus on how agencies can align their workforces to achieve their mission goals. Daphnis, speaking yesterday at ACT-IAC’s Imagine Nation conference in Hershey, Pa., said among the topics the boards will address are improving organizational health and performance and how two groups can work together within their agencies in the future.
The Department of Defense (DoD) has launched a new open source intelligence strategy. The DoD is emphasizing artificial intelligence and data science as part of its new five-year OSINT strategy. The document released by the Defense Intelligence Agency earlier this month outlines the DoD’s approach to the evolving OSINT space. The strategy states that AI technologies will be crucial to managing and analyzing an ever-increasing flow of open source data. The DIA also wants to make OSINT a leading intelligence discipline by institutionalizing training, professions and career paths.