Public-Private information-sharing program in Maryland | 07.10.2006 | 06:54:36 | Views: 5728 | ID: July 10 '06: Maryland officials are working with the state's private sector to help coordinate critical infrastructure information during a crisis through a system of business volunteers "from 17 critical infrastructures sectors to expedite office access to proprietary information likely needed during a national or regional emergency," the Examiner reported Monday. A liaison for the state office of domestic preparedness and law enforcement told the Examiner, "The structure [of the overall task force] is to work alongside the federal Department of Homeland Security to protect [the state's] critical infrastructure, which has many components." Mel Blizzard, the liaison, continued: "The system that we put into place is an oversight committee, [which] involves three people to review our processes; a steering committee, which is the operational work group that develops the operational procedures to push the program forward; and, more importantly ... the private sector component." Under the information-sharing project, a Private Sector Work group "works bimonthly in public-private partnership with the Critical Infrastructure Protection Program task force to resolve issues of sensitive information swapping and, in time of emergency or shut-down, to securely convey critical notices to authorized area businesses." Though the names of most businesses working with Maryland homeland security officials are being withheld, one non-critical group working with the information-sharing group is the 500-member Greater Baltimore Committee. GBC Director of Communications Gene Bracken told the Examiner, "We're encouraging our members to cooperate, but we're also representing business interests when it comes to homeland security. ... We try to be problem-solvers."
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