http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A34171-2003Jan9.html By Brian Krebs washingtonpost.com Staff Writer Thursday, January 9, 2003 The White House is planning to nominate a former intelligence agency chairman and a high-ranking Commerce Department official to shape the way information technology is used in the fight against terrorism, according to government and technology industry sources. The nominees will be key players in the new Department of Homeland Security and would be profoundly influential on a range of technology issues, including protecting the nation's online infrastructure, directing the development of new surveillance and defense technologies and preserving the privacy rights of ordinary citizens. James Clapper, former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, will be nominated to lead the department's Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection (IAIP) division. He would be responsible not only for IT security, but also for getting often competing intelligence agencies to pool their data. Inter-agency rivalries contributed to a lack of awareness of terrorist activity that presaged the Sept. 11 attacks in New York, Virginia and Pennsylvania, according to a number of studies after the fact. Commerce Department official John Tritak will be tapped to run the Infrastructure Protection division under Clapper, administration sources said. A spokesman for Clapper declined to comment. Tritak did not return repeated telephone calls. A retired U.S. Air Force lieutenant general, Clapper runs the National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA), which analyzes satellite photos and makes military maps. He formerly served as vice president and director of intelligence programs at SRA International, a Fairfax-based defense contractor. Clapper, who would report to Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge, is an effective leader who can accomplish a great deal without letting his ego get in the way, said former National Security Agency Deputy Director Stewart Baker. "He's the sort of guy they send in to rescue agencies when they're struggling or in trouble, and he'll probably stay a few years setting things up and then head off to a new fire," Baker said. "He doesn't seem to be carrying any agenda other than to get the job done well." One senior intelligence officer said Clapper faces a "monstrous" task. "Everything else looks easy in comparison," he said. "Either part of his bifurcated title is tough enough. Put them both together, and it's mission impossible ... If it's not mission impossible, it's mission in need of a miracle." Tritak, regarded in the business community as a consensus-builder, is seen as a shoe-in for the "Infrastructure Protection" section. He is the director of the Commerce Department's Critical Infrastructure Assurance Office (CIAO), which coordinates government and private-sector efforts to protect important networks from physical and cyber-based attacks. A senior congressional source said high-ranking CIA officer Joan Dempsey is a strong candidate for the Information Analysis division under Clapper, but a source in the intelligence community said she is not in the running. The head of the Information Analysis division would be in charge of convincing rival spy agencies to share information. Collaboration among agencies is tough to achieve, said Kim Dougherty, vice president of national security affairs at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. "Each has this defensive posture and doesn't want to show or share all their cards, and it's vital that you have someone who understands this and can work through the various bureaucracies," Dougherty said. One key technology post has already been filled at the department. Steven Cooper will serve as chief information officer, taking on essentially the same role he had for the past year in the White House Office of Homeland Security. Cooper will be responsible for integrating disparate information technology systems from 24 agencies that are moving into the new department. He previously served as executive director of Strategic Information Delivery for Corning Inc. The White House has not yet chosen an undersecretary of Science and Technology, who would supervise the Homeland Security Advanced Research Projects Agency (HSARPA), a division of the department with a proposed $500 million budget. HSARPA will be modeled after the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), a Defense Department program that was instrumental in creating the framework of the Internet in the 1960s. The White House also will name a chief privacy officer for the department, responding to comments from lawmakers, civil liberties groups and the public that defending against terrorism should not compromise privacy rights. The administration is considering Nuala O'Connor Kelly, chief counsel at the Commerce Department's Technology Administration, sources said, as well as Andy Purdy, an adviser on the president's cybersecurity team. O'Connor Kelly was deputy privacy officer at Internet banner ad giant DoubleClick Inc. Purdy has been chief deputy general counsel at the U.S. Sentencing Commission since 1989, and a staff member of the Senate Ethics Committee. Purdy said he is interested in the job, adding, "It is an important and challenging position that is going to present a great opportunity to whoever is appointed." O'Connor Kelly did not return telephone calls seeking comment. Richard Clarke, the White House's cybersecurity point man since 1998, will not join the department, but will remain chairman of the President's Critical Infrastructure Protection Board, according to one administration official and several technology lobbyists with close ties to the administration's cybersecurity program. The board plans to release a national cybersecurity strategy later this month or in early February. All of the undersecretary and assistant secretary nominees must be confirmed by the U.S. Senate, though it remains unclear which committees will review them and when. The department is expected to be operational by Jan. 24, and already is scouting three possible locations in Fairfax County, the Washington Post reported Wednesday. - ISN is currently hosted by Attrition.org To unsubscribe email majordomoat_private with 'unsubscribe isn' in the BODY of the mail.
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