U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS)
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Activist Group Sues US Border Agency Over New, Vast Intelligence System
The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) has sued the United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) in an attempt to compel the government agency to hand over documents relating to a relatively new comprehensive intelligence database of people and cargo crossing the US border...
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DHS Cancels $6 Billon Program To Detect Bioweapons, With No Plan B
Six weeks ago, amid cost overruns and technological miscalculations, the Department of Homeland Security canceled a $5.8 billion program intended to upgrade the biological weapon detection systems it deployed in the aftermath of the 2001 anthrax attacks in cities thorough America.
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DHS Health Care IT In Disarray
The Department of Homeland Security last year deployed a multi-million dollar electronic health record system to provide end-to-end health care services for the tens of thousands of illegal immigrants currently held in DHS detention facilities. But a new report by the health arm of the National Academy of Sciences shows the department has largely failed to provide its own employees in high-risk jobs with even the most basic health services and has yet to deploy an electronic system capable of capturing information on employee health, safety and readiness...
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DHS Investigates Possible Vulnerabilities In Medical Devices, Report Indicates
Citing an unnamed senior official at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Reuters reported on Wednesday that the agency is investigating roughly 24 cases of suspected vulnerabilities in medical devices and hospital equipment...
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Feds Investigating Two Dozen Potential Hacks Targeting Life-Saving Medical Devices
A senior official at the Department of Homeland Security tells Reuters that government experts are now investigating upwards of two dozen instances in which high-tech medical products may be prone to hackers...
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Forget The Sony Hack, This Could Be The Biggest Cyber Attack Of 2015
...[A]ccording to cyber-security professionals, the Sony hack may be a prelude to a cyber attack on United States infrastructure that could occur in 2015, as a result of a very different, self-inflicted document dump from the Department of Homeland Security in July...
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GAO Tech Chief Says Washington Should Start Small On Big Projects
...At a Senate hearing last week, David A. Powner, information technology director at the Government Accountability Office, said 183 of 759 federal technology contracts, worth about $10 billion, were in danger of failing before completion...
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Heartbleed Superbug Found In Utility Monitoring Systems
Software that monitors utility plants and other operations at several military installations has been found to be affected by the recently discovered superbug Heartbleed, when configured a certain way, according to the Homeland Security Department and the software’s manufacturer...
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Report Highlights Positive Elements of U.S. Government Open Source Adoption
I think we've all read our fair share of reports about lessons learned and the challenges and opportunities for governments taking up open source software. Frankly, many of them seem a bit dry, and often repetitive. But one study I recently came across (that has not received much media coverage) stood out. Its predicate was different that most, recognizing the positive: open source software (OSS) "is being used in [the U.S.] government, as well as being released by the government (as both minor improvements and whole new projects), and the government is receiving benefits from doing so. However, many in government are unaware of this." In short, it appears to find the glass half filled—or better—rather than half empty...
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Security Experts Warn Congress That the Internet of Things Could Kill People
A growing mass of poorly secured devices on the Internet of things represents a serious risk to life and property, and the government must intervene to mitigate it. That’s essentially the message that prominent computer security experts recently delivered to Congress. The huge denial-of-service attack in October that crippled the Internet infrastructure provider Dyn and knocked out much of the Web for users in the eastern United States was “benign,” Bruce Schneier, a renowned security scholar and lecturer on public policy at Harvard, said during a hearing last month held by the House Energy and Commerce Committee...
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Thousands Of People Oblivious To Fact That Anyone On The Internet Can Access Their Computers
...While talking about the issue at hacker conference Defcon on Sunday, security engineer Paul McMillan sent his winged monkey scanners out looking for computers that have remote access software on them, but no password. In just that short hour, the results came pouring in: thousands of computers on port 5900 using a program called VNC for remote access...
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U.S. Government Probes Medical Devices For Possible Cyber Flaws
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is investigating about two dozen cases of suspected cybersecurity flaws in medical devices and hospital equipment that officials fear could be exploited by hackers, a senior official at the agency told Reuters...
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VA Plans To Build Nationwide High-Frequency Radio Network To Communicate During Emergencies
The Department of Veterans Affairs plans to build a nationwide high-frequency radio network to connect its medical facilities in case of an emergency that knocks out other forms of communications -- applying century-old technology to current needs...
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Virtual Heroes Division Of Applied Research Associates, Inc. Releases Download Of Emergency Response Game Zero Hour
Web release of Virtual Heroes' Zero Hour: America’s Medic, a first-person 3D video game for training emergency responders, enables no-cost access to EMS training...
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What Happened to America's Most Important Arctic Ships?
The U.S. Coast Guard is facing a dilemma at the North Pole. The service's fleet of icebreakers, ships designed to navigate and cut through ice-covered waters in the Arctic and Antarctic regions, is getting older...
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