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New information-sharing plan for federal government | 11.20.2006 | 03:36:21 | Views: 5670 | ID: November 20 '06: The Washington Post reported over the weekend that a new plan to streamline information-sharing among federal, state and local government officials will "reduce more than 100 restrictive and confusing categories of 'sensitive' federal information ... so local-level officials can better understand what they are told." The new federal guidelines issued will create the Interagency Threat Assessment Coordination Group a DNI plan announced. A press release said that the changes are part of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004. The crux of the problem when it comes to information-sharing, the Post continued, is that state and local officials "have long complained of a lack of coordination among the federal agencies that send terrorism-related alerts, analysis and instructions. ... [the new plan] also ordered creation of new systems to ensure that terrorism information was adequately shared among federal, state and local entities." The changes come as part of a post-9/11, redesign of the government's intelligence community with the creation of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the National Counterterrorism Center. Officials told the post they wanted to eliminate the "cultural inertia" that existed among government agencies because of the lack of communication about sometimes sensitive information. The plan's architect, Thomas McNamara and his office under the guidance of the DNI, told the Post, "A lot of people think that information-sharing ... means that security and control of the information being shared will be diminished, and if security diminishes, that's negative." "I'm trying to convince them that if this is done right, security will be at least as good and possibly better," McNamara said.
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