DHS Awards University Consortium $2M to Bolster Cyber Workforce
The Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology Directorate, in partnership with the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), has awarded $2 million to the Critical Infrastructure Resilience Institute (CIRI) to develop a plan for a national network of cyber security institutes to help build the nation's cyber workforce. CIRI is led by the Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and includes Auburn Univ., Purdue Univ. and the Univ. of Tulsa. "CISA sees the growing cyber security workforce shortage in the United States as a national security risk," says Bryan Ware, the agency's assistant director of Cybersecurity. "With our government and private sector partners, CISA is striving to ‘secure tomorrow' by preparing, growing and sustaining the nation's cyber security workforce. This award to create a national network of institutes to educate and train dynamic and diverse cyber security professionals is part of the administration and CISA's initiatives and efforts to begin a trend of reducing this workforce gap." CIRI is charged with developing a plan that uses an academic hub-and-spoke model to create a national network of cyber security institutes to educate and train cyber professionals.
OSI Systems Gets $93M in Security Contracts
OSI Systems [OSIS] says its Rapiscan security division has received multiple contracts worth $93 million from an international government customer to provide various X-Ray cargo and vehicle inspection systems, baggage and parcel inspection systems, trace detection systems, and related maintenance and support. The customer wasn't disclosed. OSI says the detection systems will be used to help secure the country's borders.
DHS S&T Awards IDSS $4M Contract to Integrated CT with X-Ray Diffraction
Integrated Defense and Security Solutions (IDSS) says it has received a contract from the Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate to integrate Halo X-ray Technologies' X-Ray Diffraction technology with the company's DETECT 1000 computed tomography (CT) scanner to enhance detection capability and reduce false alarm rates of airport and narcotics checkpoint scanning systems. DHS S&T tells HSR that the contract has a base year value of $1.6 million, a second year option of $1.5 million, and a third year option of $600,000. An IDSS spokeswoman tells HSR that integrated Halo's XRD technology with the DETECT system won't alter the footprint of the checkpoint CT scanner. She says the integration of the XRD technology "is potentially game changing because it will give Transportation Security Officers a greater degree of certainty regarding the identification of potential threats in carry-on bags, cutting down on physical searches and divesting." The DETECT 1000 was the winner of the DHS Opioid Challenge for the ability to detect opioids in mail. IDSS says integrating XRD technology has the potential to quickly resolve false alarms, increasing the number of packages that may be scanned each day while reducing labor costs associated with manual inspections.