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26 Jun 14. Scott AFB Lands 2 New Cybersecurity Squadrons. Two new cybersecurity squadrons — about 320 new personnel and $16m in infrastructure spending — are coming to Scott Air Force Base. Rep. Bill Enyart, D-Collinsville, whose district includes the base, called it “a huge win.” “This is a direct message from the Air Force about Scott’s critical role in cybersecurity,” he said in an email. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., who chairs the defense subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee, said the new squadrons give Scott Air Force Base “a leading role in supporting the Air Force’s cybersecurity operations, which are critically important to our national security efforts.” The Air Force is expanding cyber squadrons in 11 locations across the country, said Laura Taylor, Enyart’s communications director. Scott and Joint Base San Antonio in Texas were chosen from seven finalists for the new cyberprotection squadrons. Taylor called the protection squadron’s work “critical.” They monitor for attacks to the nation’s computer networks, identify hackers, stop the attacks, and repair the damage. In addition, the protection squads conduct “penetration testing” — they pretend to be hackers and try to break into military, Pentagon or other national computer systems. “You hear a lot about cyberterrorism,” Taylor said. “These are the folks who go out and protect us against the people we can’t see.” Scott Air Force Base’s public affairs office didn’t have additional information immediately available. A spokeswoman said the base already houses three cyber units. In March, Durbin led top military and civilian officials on a tour of the base in an effort to head off any possible plan to close Scott should it be targeted by a future Base Realignment and Closure Commission. In April, Scott cut nearly 100 positions from its Network Integration Center, including 53 civilian jobs. A spokesman said leaders were responding to budget constraints, and had to make “tough choices for a smaller future Air Force.” Those jobs, the spokesman said, would be phased out through 2015. It’s unclear what effect Wednesday’s announcement would have on them. But Taylor said it was a good sign for Scott. “Obviously, no one can predict the future, and we can’t make any comments about base closing, because we just don’t have that information,” Taylor said. “But I certainly think it shows the value of Scott Air Force Base to the Air Force and to our nation’s cybersecurity.” Scott is the fourth-largest employer in the St. Louis area, with 5,100 civilian staff in addition to 5,500 active-duty Air Force and 2,400 Air National Guard and Reserve personnel. Enyart, a former adjutant general of the Illinois National Guard, said the Air Force has signalled it wants to use Illinois National Guard personnel to support the new squadrons. Enyart said project development will begin immediately, and positions will be filled over the next two years. (Source: Open Source Information Report/St. Louis Post-Dispatch)
28 Jun 14. U.S. Navy seeks big data ecosystem. According to a notice published June 19 at FedBizOpps, the Office of Naval Research is interested in white papers and full proposals for advanced technology development that will forge major advancements towards a well-developed and robust naval big data ecosystem that enables more sophisticated and powerful analytics for supporting naval warfighting applications.
ONR’s notice delineates four key areas:
1. Development of a robust Naval Data Science foundation that addresses data representations and ontologies required to support a wide range of naval warfare mission areas;
2. Identifying, acquiring, ingesting, and indexing data sources pertinent to naval warfighting missions;
3. Development of advanced analytics for naval warfare mission areas, and;
4. Development of data protect