U.S. Response:  Report Faults Nuclear Plant Security

Security personnel at New York’s Indian Point nuclear plant believe the facility may be unprepared for a terrorist attack, the New York Times reported yesterday (see GSN, Oct. 24).

“Only 19 percent of the security officers stated that they could adequately defend the plant after the terrorist event of Sept. 11,” said a recently released report commissioned by the plant’s owner in January this year after complaints from guards.  Keith Logan, a former Nuclear Regulatory Commission investigator, interviewed more than 50 security guards for the report.

The report examined the fitness of the guards, the tests that measure their fitness and the plant’s security equipment.

Many of the weaknesses pointed out in the report have been addressed, said James Streets, a spokesman for the plant’s owner, Entergy Nuclear Northeast.  Entergy has installed a new perimeter fence, concrete barriers, new security cameras and bullet resistant protection for guards, the Times reported.

“We took it seriously,” Streets said of the report.  “And we took appropriate actions to address the findings in it,” he added.

In interviews conducted after the report was released, however, guards said that many of the report’s findings — including faulty alarm systems mended with tape — have not been addressed.  Plant personnel also told of rigged security drills, out-of-shape guards and security personnel showing up for work drunk.  Foster Zeh, a security sergeant at the plant, said that he twice reported a security officer reporting for work “drunk as a skunk,” but the officer was sent home without punishment.

There is no official record of any such incident, said Streets.  “So I really wonder whether that’s true or not,” he said regarding the reports of drunkenness.  Zeh is currently on paid suspension, which he said he believes he is a result of his complaints about lax security (Richard Perez-Pena, New York Times, Dec. 8).

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International Response:  IMO Looks to New Shipping Security Codes

The U.N. International Maritime Organization plans to meet Monday to pass new security regulations pushed by the United States as necessary, but criticized by others as “draconian” and expensive.

Regulations from the International Ship and Port Security Code are expected to be made into law as amendments to the Safety of Life at Sea Convention, the Financial Times reported today (see GSN, Nov. 6).

The U.S. Container Security Initiative has provided much of the impetus behind the new code, which would designate responsibilities for gathering information and detecting threats to shipping and ports (see GSN, Nov. 27).  A range of security levels would prompt different sets of security procedures in ports and on vessels.  On board, some crew members would be responsible for controlling and monitoring ships.  The new proposals might be amended, but they are expected to be passed in some form, the Financial Times reported.

The cost of implementing the new regulations has not been discussed in the effort to craft the code, said David Whitehead of the British Ports Association.  Those figures are being assessed now, according to the Times, and European port officials have said that the burden should fall on governments.

The U.S. container initiative has already placed burdens on shipping and the cost of future controls is difficult to estimate, said Chris Koch of the World Shipping Council.  Implementing the regulations included in the U.S. initiative has been like “trying to drink out of a fire hose,” Koch said.

“European transport operators feel they are being railroaded into all sorts of draconian measures,” one international trade official said (Toby Shelley, Financial Times, Dec. 5).

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U.S. Response:  Military Commander Espouses “Need to Share” Information

By Molly M. Peterson

Technology Daily

WASHINGTON — Officials at the newly established U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM) may have to consider abandoning the military’s traditional system for classifying information as they build crucial lines of communication with federal, state and local homeland security agencies, NORTHCOM’s chief information officer said recently.

Speaking to reporters at a homeland security summit late last month, Maj. Gen. Dale Meyerrose said interagency information sharing is a “blossoming requirement” for NORTHCOM, which is headquartered at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, Colo.  The command is charged with consolidating the military’s homeland defense and civil-support missions.

The Defense Department’s current classification system allows military offices to share information on a need-to-know basis and requires security clearances and background checks for access to information with such labels as “top secret” and “classified.”  But Meyerrose said that system might hinder NORTHCOM’s ability to share real-time information with civilian agencies that classify their information differently.

“My mantra is that I need to change from a ‘need to know’ to a ‘need to share’ foundation,” Meyerrose said.  “That is fundamentally a different level of information-exchanging requirement,” he added.

Federal law generally prohibits direct military involvement in domestic law enforcement, but during terrorist attacks and other national emergencies that might exceed the capabilities of federal, state and local agencies, the Pentagon can assign NORTHCOM to provide civil support.

Meyerrose noted that in order to provide that assistance, NORTHCOM must be able to communicate quickly and efficiently with emergency management officials at all levels of government, using radios, computers and other technologies.

“I am not advocating that we undo the need to know [classification] associated with national security information, but my requirements are going to be driven by a need to share, not a need to know,” he said.  “But we’re developing a lot of things, so we have not formally stated that requirement,” he added.

Meyerrose said NORTHCOM also must build on existing information-sharing architectures, such as those that have allowed the Federal Aviation Administration to exchange data with the North American Aerospace Defense Command.

“We’re trying to make sure we don’t reinvent any of those wheels,” Meyerrose said, adding that NORTHCOM is interested in ideas from the private and academic sectors.  “We have our catcher’s mitt open. We’re listening,” he said.

Lockheed Martin will play a key role in meeting NORTHCOM’s information technology requirements.  The company recently won two contracts, totaling $5.8 million, to help NORTHCOM integrate various systems and develop new information operations capabilities.

“We have begun work on the contracts, and we’re looking forward to helping them with their IT and infrastructure,” Lockheed spokesman Joe Wagovich said Tuesday.

For more information, see:

U.S. Northern Command

Peterson Air Force Base

Federal Aviation Administration

North American Aerospace Defense Command

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