Dual-Benefit Solutions

Alabama: Wilderness Training Is Useful in Post-Storm Scenarios (Mobile [AL] Register) “Doctors, paramedics and scoutmasters taking part in a special training program beginning Sunday will be learning how to deal with lightning-strike injuries, heat strokes, alligator bites and broken bones when they’re miles from hospitals and medical equipment,” reports the Register. The training will be useful in disasters. Tod Schimelpfenig, curriculum director for the Wilderness Medicine Institute of the National Outdoor Leadership School, “said the flooded roads and lack of electricity in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina created a wilderness environment in the city that doctors had to operate in.” [View article]

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Federal News

Bush Proposes Strategy for Pandemic Flu President Bush on 1 November announced a $7.1 billion strategy to prepare for a possible flu pandemic. This strategy, he said, “is designed to meet three critical goals: First, we must detect outbreaks that occur anywhere in the world; second, we must protect the American people by stockpiling vaccines and antiviral drugs, and improve our ability to rapidly produce new vaccines against a pandemic strain; and, third, we must be ready to respond at the federal, state and local levels in the event that a pandemic reaches our shores.” [View press release]

DHS Urges Businesses to Prepare for Emergencies The Department of Homeland Security is launching “Ready Business,” an extension of the “Ready” campaign to educate owners and managers of small to medium-sized businesses about preparing their employees, operations, and assets for emergencies. During November, public-service announcements will focus on the affordability and ease of business continuity planning, as well as the resources available to aid businesses in that process. [View press release]

DHS Announces Plan to Secure U.S. Borders Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced on Wednesday a multi-year plan to secure America’s borders and reduce illegal migration, entitled the Secure Border Initiative, which will focus on all aspects of illegal migration--deterrence, detection, apprehension, detention, and removal--by implementing increased staffing, more robust interior enforcement, greater investment in detection technology and infrastructure, and enhanced coordination on federal, state, local, and international levels. [View press release]

DHS Issues Draft Natl. Infrastructure Protection Plan The Homeland Security Department’s draft National Infrastructure Protection Base Plan is available, on request, for review and comment. Email NIPP@dhs.gov or write to the NIPP Program Management Office, DHS, Preparedness Directorate/IP/IPD, Mail Stop 8560, Washington, DC 20528-8560. Include your name, organization’s name, mailing address, and email address when submitting your request. For further information contact Charles Davis at the same address; (703) 235-5338; Charles.H.Davis@dhs.gov. [View announcement]

Assessing the State of Homeland Security “The United States has taken a number of impressive steps since 9/11/2001 to protect itself against terror,” said the Brookings Institution’s Michael O’Hanlon, Senior Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies, on 26 October, testifying before the Senate Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology, and Homeland Security (Judiciary Committee). However, “much remains to be done” (see the Quote of the Week). [View testimony]

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National News

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CIA Holds Terror Suspects in Secret Prisons (Washington Post) “The CIA has been hiding and interrogating some of its most important al Qaeda captives at a Soviet-era compound in Eastern Europe, according to U.S. and foreign officials familiar with the arrangement,” reports the Washington Post. “The secret facility is part of a covert prison system set up by the CIA nearly four years ago that at various times has included sites in eight countries, including Thailand, Afghanistan and several democracies in Eastern Europe, as well as a small center at the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba, according to current and former intelligence officials and diplomats from three continents.” But “Poland and Romania were among about a dozen nations that denied having CIA facilities in their territory.… Bulgaria, Hungary, Latvia, Georgia and Armenia also issued denials.” [View article on prisons] [View article on denials]

Photo courtesy of Steve Dunham

U.S. Transit Systems Lack Security Standards (Metro magazine) “U.S. urban transit systems are still lacking in many areas of security, including standards, preparedness and emergency response, according to a panel of security experts” at “the 6th Annual TriState Transit Symposium, hosted last [month] by New York University’s Rudin Center for Transportation Policy and Management,” reports Metro magazine. The panel “also said that technology should not be seen as the cure-all for security.” [View article]

Better Intelligence and Info Sharing Top Transport Security Wish List (Federal Computer Week) Federal transportation security officials want “technologies that aid decision-making in high-volume environments,” reports Federal Computer Week. Security officials attending the Technologies for Critical Incident Preparedness Conference and Exposition, which ended Wednesday, weighed in with technologies they’d like to see implemented; for instance, the Coast Guard would “like to augment the Automated Identity System, a system of VHF transponders on vessels, to provide ports with the ability to see all vessels at any given moment … Law enforcement personnel protecting U.S. land borders would benefit from having real-time biometric, name-based verification of identities of people crossing the border … [and] Ports need new detection and diagnostics equipment particularly for rail environments.” [View article]

Attacks on U.S. Border Patrol Surging (Los Angeles Times) “Assaults against U.S. Border Patrol agents nearly doubled along the Mexican border over the last year as patrols cracking down on drug trafficking and migrant smuggling encountered increasing resistance--including the use of rocks, Molotov cocktails and gunfire,” reports the Los Angeles Times. “At least 687 assaults against agents were reported during the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, up from the previous year’s total of 354 and the highest since the agency began tracking assaults across the Southwest border in the late 1990s.” [View article]

Deportation Spreads Gang Members Across U.S. (Los Angeles Times) “A deportation policy aimed in part at breaking up a Los Angeles street gang [Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13] has backfired and helped spread it across Central America and back into other parts of the United States,” reports the Los Angeles Times. “Newly organized cells in El Salvador have returned to establish strongholds in metropolitan Washington, D.C., and other U.S. cities. Prisons in El Salvador have become nerve centers, authorities say, where deported leaders from Los Angeles communicate with gang cliques across the United States. A gang that once numbered a few thousand and was involved in street violence and turf battles has morphed into an international network with as many as 50,000 members.” [View article]

Maintenance Costs for Airport Scanners Spike (USA Today) “Congress has ordered an investigation into what it says are ‘skyrocketing costs’ of fixing and keeping up machines that scan luggage for bombs at the nation’s airports,” reports USA Today. “Taxpayers will spend about $200 million in the current fiscal year fixing and maintaining about 1,200 luggage scanners, roughly double the repair costs that the Department of Homeland Security says were needed two years ago.” [View article]

Gaps Remain in Govt. Handling of Natural Disasters (Government Executive) “Despite the billions of taxpayer dollars spent every year on emergency preparedness and disaster cleanup, the United States lacks an overall strategy for reducing the number of lives lost and the amount of property destroyed when Mother Nature unleashes a wildfire, earthquake, flood, hurricane, tsunami, or other calamity,” reports the National Journal. “On paper, federal, state, and local planners prescribe an ‘all-hazards’ approach to preparing for disasters--a one-size-fits-all plan on how to anticipate and respond to the many non-terrorism hazards, everything from volcanic eruptions to chemical spills. In reality, though, federal agencies and their state and local counterparts organize their plans into disaster-specific programs of detection, prevention, and response, while specific agencies remain focused on particular kinds of disasters. And all responders still have to deal with federal bureaucratic infrastructures that grew haphazardly out of past crises and are strapped for cash.” [View article]

Internet Helps People Cope With Disasters (Federal Computer Week) “Several disaster and technology experts say the Internet is a more powerful tool than anything else for communicating, sharing information and interacting during disasters,” reports Federal Computer Week. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, sites flourished to help people. “David Stephenson, who teaches about technology and criminal justice at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell and writes about homeland security in a Web log, said the KatrinaHelp wiki was more comprehensive than any government source, including FEMA.” But there are cautions as well. Claire “Rubin, a visiting scholar at the George Washington University’s Institute for Crisis, Disaster and Risk Management, said she doesn’t think researchers have studied much about using the Internet during disasters. But she said there’s a greater chance of fraud and error as more sites offer information.” [View article]

TSA Moves to Clarify Federal Security Directors’ Authority (Government Executive) “The Transportation Security Administration is updating guidance to clarify the responsibilities of its federal security directors” in response to criticism in a report by the Government Accountability Office, according to Government Executive. (See last week’s newsletter item.) “TSA officials told GAO in August that a revised ‘delegation order’ clarifying the [directors’] authorities was being reviewed internally.” TSA is also developing “a new staffing model for allocating screeners at airports, a reassessment of the number of management positions allocated to each” federal security director, “and a reassessment of which and how many airports are assigned to each.” [View article]

TSA Names Three Directors to Oversee Nationwide Security The Transportation Security Administration on 27 October named Maggie Rhodes, Leo Vasquez, Jr., and Dennis Clark as the three Area Directors to oversee transportation security at airports and in other modes of transportation for the East Coast, Central and Western areas, respectively. Full-time Area Director positions are being established to give greater flexibility and coordination in providing TSA support to all Federal Security Directors in the field. Area Directors are now in a position to work directly with headquarters staff in a team approach to resolve issues and be an integral part of responses to incidents affecting the transportation systems in their areas. They will not only oversee Federal Security Directors at airports, but ensure that security procedures and responses are carried out effectively for the viability of the national transportation system. [View press release]

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International News

European Commission Will Investigate Secret CIA Jails (London Guardian) “The European commission is to investigate claims the CIA is holding al-Qaida captives at Soviet era compounds in eastern Europe,” reports the London Guardian. “… Poland and Romania are thought the most likely locations in Europe, according to the New York–based Human Rights Watch and Polish press reports. If the reports are true, the secret jails would violate European human rights law prohibiting unlawful detention.” [View article]

Australian Prime Minister Warns of Attack (London Times; Melbourne, Australia, Age) “Australia has received specific intelligence that terrorists are planning an attack on the country, its Prime Minister [John Howard] said” Wednesday, according to the Associated Press and the London Times. “In his most explicit terror warning, during a televised press conference in Canberra, John Howard refused to give any details of the threat, saying he did not want to jeopardise counterterror operations.” He “rejected suggestions [that] his announcement … was timed to coincide with the introduction of controversial new laws,” reports the Melbourne Age. [View Times article] [View Age article]

Syria Has Given ‘Full Access’ to UN Team, Says Minister (Lebanon Daily Star) “Syria vowed on Tuesday to cooperate fully with the UN investigation into the murder of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri after the Security Council passed a resolution demanding [that] Damascus cooperate within a six-week deadline or face the consequences,” reports the Daily Star. “Syrian officials have repeatedly maintained [that] they have been cooperating with the UN probe, and strongly criticized the latest resolution as being ‘very negative toward Syria.’” [View article]

Tourists Visiting Australia May Have to Declare Travelers’ Checks (New Zealand Herald) “Tourists arriving in or exiting Australia may have to declare their cache of travellers cheques, or they could be confiscated under the federal government’s new anti-terrorism laws,” reports the New Zealand Press Association. “Existing law requires people to tell officers if they are taking more than $A10,000 ($NZ10,803) worth of cash in or out of Australia, but new financial transaction reporting requirements attached to the proposed Anti-Terrorism Bill 2005 include a provision to show travellers cheques as well.” [View article]

Canadian Guarantees Against Torture Are Baseless, Says Review Committee (Toronto Globe and Mail) “The Canadian Security Intelligence Service has been giving false assurances to the government that it can guarantee [that] the intelligence it receives from foreign agencies is not obtained by torture, [the Security Intelligence Review Committee] said,” according to the Globe and Mail. The Intelligence Service “‘was not in a position to provide such an absolute assurance’ and should stop saying so, the Security Intelligence Review Committee said in its report to Parliament.” [View article]

New South African Law Allows Phones to Be Tapped (Johannesburg Mail and Guardian) “A new law will allow telephones to be tapped and e-mails to be intercepted in the fight against crime,” reports the South African Press Association. “… the lawful interception of communications … can only be done after authorisation by a judge especially designated to perform that function.… for the Act to be a success, it requires the cooperation of the private sector, especially telecommunication service providers, as well as individual owners of cellphones.” [View article]

Scotland Yard Officer Admits ‘Shoot to Kill’ Error (London Times) “Scotland Yard’s so-called ‘shoot to kill to protect’ tactic to deal with suicide bombers should have been disclosed to the public much earlier, a senior officer said [on 27 October],” reports the Times. “Assistant Commissioner Stephen House was outlining changes to the force’s anti-terror strategy at a meeting of the Metropolitan Police Authority (MPA), which oversees the work of the Met. The tactic involves police marksmen shooting a suspected suicide bomber in the head with no warning to stop them from detonating their device.… The public became fully aware of the tactic’s existence only after it was controversially put into practice on July 22 at Stockwell tube station, when armed police officers shot Jean Charles de Menezes seven times in the head. The 27-year-old Brazilian electrician was afterwards found to have no connection with terrorism.” [View article]

Administration Debates Treatment of Suspects (International Herald Tribune) “More than three years after President George W. Bush determined that the Geneva conventions did not apply to the fight against terrorism, his administration is embroiled in a sharp internal debate over whether to adopt language from those accords as a basic guide for the military’s treatment of terrorist suspects, administration officials said,” reports the New York Times. “… The immediate dispute centers on whether a Pentagon directive that will establish minimum standards for the treatment of captured enemy combatants should be based on an article of the conventions that prohibits treatment that is ‘cruel,’ ‘humiliating’ or ‘degrading.’” [View article]

Canada Unveils Revamped Immigration Rules (Toronto Globe and Mail ) Ottawa is unveiling sweeping changes to immigration, starting on 31 October “with an increase in the annual intake of new Canadians, and a promise to increase much-needed temporary workers and tackle the enormous backlog of 700,000 prospective immigrants,” reports the Toronto Globe and Mail. “Immigration Minister Joe Volpe … says Canada hopes to be taking in as many as 300,000 immigrants a year within five years, and will start by raising its target for next year to between 225,000 and 255,000. Canada is on track to accept 245,000 this year, the very high end of last year’s target.” Canada is “producing more jobs than the labour market has workers for,” Volpe told the newspaper. [View article]

England’s Intelligence Services ‘Let Bomber Slip Through Net’ (London Times) “The leader of the four London suicide bombers who killed 52 people on July 7 had been under surveillance by [intelligence service] MI5 last year,” the British Broadcasting Corporation has claimed, according to the Times. “Mohammad Siddique Khan, the teaching assistant from Leeds, was secretly filmed speaking to a UK-based terrorist suspect, according to a File on 4/Newsnight investigation. The BBC said that new evidence showed the intelligence services had let the future ringleader slip through the net. MI5 acknowledged after the attacks that his name had cropped up in an another inquiry but security sources denied that he had ever been classed as a terrorist suspect, or that he had been under further surveillance. The BBC claimed that Siddique Khan had been in contact with al-Qaeda for five years.” [View article]

Legal Blunder May Free ‘Terror Envoy’ (London Times) “An extraordinary legal blunder by [British] officials may allow a suspected terror ringleader being held in Britain to go free,” reports the London Times. “Italian officials claim that Britain has taken so long to extradite Farj Hassan Faraj that a three-year deadline has passed and he can no longer face trial in Milan for plotting bomb attacks in Europe.… Mr Faraj, 24, has been described as the ‘European envoy’ for the Iraqi terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who is blamed for car bomb attacks on US and British troops and the murder of Western hostages.” [View article]

The End for Loyalist Terror Group (BBC News) “A splinter loyalist paramilitary group, the Loyalist Volunteer Force, has said that it is to stand down,” reports the British Broadcasting Corporation. “It said the decision was taken in response to the IRA move to decommission arms in September.” [View article]

Suicide Bomber Filmed Arguing Over Money (Scotsman) “Video footage of the last movements of the July 7 suicide bombers shows one of them arguing with a cashier about being short-changed just hours before he blew himself up,” reports the Scotsman. “The bomber who destroyed a double-decker bus was also captured on [closed-circuit TV] knocking into people on the streets of London before the attacks that killed 52 people.” [View article]

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State and Local News

U.S. Flu Strategy Leans on States (Philadelphia Inquirer) The Bush administration’s plan to cope with pandemic flu “places heavy responsibility on state and local governments to distribute vaccines and antivirals, monitor the spread of the disease, and quarantine patients if needed,” reports the Inquirer. “Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt said a deadly flu could be so widespread and debilitating that the federal government would be unable to help all affected regions.” [View article]

California Transit Security Funds Misdirected, Say Experts (San Jose, CA, Mercury News) “California’s mass transit agencies are throwing too much of their scarce federal funding at preventing a hard-to-stop terrorist attack and too little preparing for an attack’s aftermath, according to security experts who studied the spending patterns for The Associated Press.… For its review of transit spending, the AP asked top counter-terror analysts in the United States and the United Kingdom to examine details of $15.5 million in federal funding six major California transit agencies have been given over the last two years. Their advice: Assume an attack will one day succeed and fine-tune the emergency reaction to respond to the carnage, confusion and disruption.” [View article]

Texas Fusion Center Will Link Law Enforcement (Houston Chronicle) “The five-year Texas Homeland Security Strategic Plan calls for the Texas Fusion Center in Austin to coordinate 34 state agencies and 24 councils of government to prevent terrorism, protect strategic resources and recover from disasters,” reports the Chronicle. “… The plan envisions creation of a 24-hour, seven-day-a-week intelligence gathering center in the coming year that will make it easier for law enforcement agencies to access each other’s data on past and current investigations and analyze patterns of threats.” [View article]

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Private-Sector News

Privacy Lost in Test of Biometric System (Houston Chronicle) Digimarc Corp., a company hired by the state of Texas “to gather computerized facial imaging and thumbprints on all Texas driver’s licenses failed to protect the identities of 7,500 Nevada drivers last spring, Nevada officials say,” reports the Chronicle. Digimarc “landed a $30 million contract last month from the Texas Department of Public Safety to collect biometric thumbprint and facial images on all Texas driver’s licenses. The new licenses won’t debut for at least two years … Yet, politicians and lawyers concerned about the new system questioned both how it will be used and how it could be misused.” [View article]

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Education Programs

The Homeland Security Institute lists these educational programs as a service to readers who may be interested; it does not endorse them or their courses.

Cross-Disciplinary Master of Science Degree The Rochester, NY, Institute of Technology, in conjunction with the Center for Advanced Defense Studies, has begun offering a cross-disciplinary master of science degree that allows students to choose their focus along three tracks: counterterrorism, cyber-security, or chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive defense. The courses are taught in Washington, DC, by computer-aided design system experts and faculty members, featuring distinguished guest speakers from the government, academic, and private sectors. A series of weeklong and weekend courses will be taught in a blended format: in person in Washington, DC, and via distance learning. The accelerated format is challenging, but courses can be taken at a slower pace if desired. To earn a Rochester Institute of Technology master’s degree in cross-disciplinary professional studies, students will complete 12 courses and 48 credit hours during 18 months of part-time studies. For more information call (202) 256-3332, or email education@c4ads.org, or visit www.c4ads.org/rit_programs.

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Upcoming Events

November

Homeland Security Procurement 101 (17 November; Washington, DC) The Department of Homeland Security will award billions of dollars in procurement contracts this year. Which companies will receive these awards, and what products will DHS purchase from them? Hear the answers at these daylong Defense Today sessions designed to help you and your team understand and participate in homeland security procurement. For more information visit www.kingpublishing.com/conferences or contact Melissa Monk by telephone at (202) 662-9732 or send an email to mmonk@kingpublishing.com.

2005 Corporate Security, Business Continuity and Crisis Management Conference: Emerging Threats to the Corporation--Strategies to Detect, Deter and Defuse Crises (17-18 November; New York) The Conference Board is hosting its fifth annual conference where the private sector can find ways to protect companies against terrorism. This event will benefit senior executives, government officials, policy experts, and other thought leaders who want to examine strategies to limit risk, control damage, maintain critical operations, and effect recovery. [View conference website]

December

2005 ThinkTEC Homeland Security Innovation Conference (1-2 December; Charleston, SC) This conference is for government contractors, military or security leaders, business executives, or community professionals who want to explore the latest innovations in port security and detection of biological, chemical, and nuclear threats. It will offer businesses the tools to prepare for avoiding security threats, preventing any impact on operations, and protecting assets in a crisis. A tour of regional homeland security facilities is also available on 30 November. [View conference website]

4th North American Cargo Security Forum (5-6 December; Washington, DC) Attendees will hear the latest government updates and regulations compliance, loss prevention strategies, and how to develop a comprehensive security program to reduce their exposure to terrorist threats and cargo crime. The latest technological and physical security solutions will be on show in a dedicated exhibition. Security and loss-prevention executives from Fortune 1000 retailers and manufacturers, cargo security executives from all modes of transport, freight forwarders, port authorities and terminal and warehouse operators, government officials, and federal state law enforcement will be there. [View conference website]

2006

Airport Security Planning Courses for General Aviation (13-14 February, Columbus, OH) Ohio University and Robinson Aviation will hold two courses for general aviation facilities. For further information, please visit www.ohiou.edu/gasecurity/. [View course website]

5th Annual Critical Infrastructure Resilience & Infrastructure Security for the Built Environment Congress & Expo (15-17 February 2006; Washington, DC) This event will bring together government and industry officials from around the world to discuss and formulate solutions to protect the homeland. Issues such as physical security, cyber-security, standards, interoperability, biometrics, threat and vulnerability assessments, research and development efforts, and first responder requirements will be discussed. [View conference website]

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