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| Webinar: Federal cloud computing adoption, a look back and forward
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Also Noted: London police urged to explain detention of reporter Glenn Greenwald's partner; White House taps McAfee CTO for DHS cybersecurity post; and much more...  Follow @fiercehs on Twitter
More News From the FierceGovernment Network:
1. Hagel lays out directives to curb sexual assault
2. Food inspectors regularly working significant overtime
3. Twitter reports rise in government requests for user information
Today's Top News 1. Hurricane Sandy Rebuilding Task Force issues guidelines
 The Obama administration task force on rebuilding after Hurricane Sandy issued guidelines on Aug. 19 for how to invest the federal funds set aside for recovery from the storm.
President Obama created the task force in an executive order in December, designating Shaun Donovan, the housing and urban development secretary, as the chair. More than 20 other cabinet secretaries and top White House officials are part of the task force. In its extensive strategy (.pdf), the task force recommends the federal government provide a forum for the coordination of large-scale, regional infrastructure projects, to map out their interdependencies. The government should also establish guidelines to ensure the projects are built to withstand disasters and future climate change, the strategy says. There are 67 other recommendations, including giving governments and residents the best available data on current and future disaster risks. One example would be to create a sea-level rise projection tool. The strategy also highlights the need to engage vulnerable populations about risk and resilience. Additionally, it recommends that the electric grid, fuel supply, and communication systems be made more resilient. Three months after Hurricane Sandy struck the East Coast, a $50.7 billion federal aid package became law Jan. 29. President Obama had also signed into law a smaller aid package, worth nearly $10 billion, on Jan. 6. The bulk of the aid was sent through the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Federal Transit Administration. For more:
- download the Hurricane Sandy Rebuilding Strategy (.pdf) Related Articles:
Hurricane Sandy aid package becomes law
Bloomberg calls for a more resilient NYC
National Hurricane Center to start issuing advisories for post-tropical cyclones Read more about: climate change, Barack Obama
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2. New self-service customs kiosks deployed in Chicago
 U.S. citizens can now use self-service kiosks to complete most of the customs process at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport, the first airport to implement the new system.
Customs and Border Protection announced on Aug. 15 that the system, called Automated Passport Control, was officially available for all U.S. citizens entering the airport's Terminal 5.
But travelers actually began using the kiosks July 1, and in their first 40 days of use, the average wait time during peak hours declined from about 50 minutes to 34 minutes, CBP says.
After disembarking from their plane, passengers can proceed directly to an Automated Passport Control kiosk, scan their passport, and use a touch screen to fill out their customs declaration. The kiosk provides a receipt, which the passengers take to a CBP officer to finalize their inspection and entry. The agency expects the kiosks to save about $4 million through fiscal 2014 by cutting more than 40,000 inspection hours--the work of 35 CBP officers, according to a CBP planning document (.pdf) released Aug. 2.
The program doesn't require any sort of membership or registration for travelers, and it's free to use. More than 60 percent of U.S. passport holders entering O'Hare Terminal 5 have used the kiosks so far, CBP says. That terminal, which two dozen air carriers operate out of, now has 32 of the self-service kiosks. "The use of APC has dramatically changed the passenger experience" at customs, the Chicago Department of Aviation said in a press release.
The Vancouver Airport Authority in Canada developed the system together with CBP. The agency says it does not cost them anything to implement the kiosks at airports, and several other airports have requested them. Florida's Orlando International Airport is slated to be the second U.S. airport to join the program.
For more:
- go to the Chicago Department of Aviation release
- go to the CBP release
Related Articles:
CBP approves unmanned pedestrian border crossing in Texas
Global Entry trusted-traveler program to become permanent
CBP to automate arrival/departure form Read more about: Canada, Chicago
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3. Mobile radiation scanners enhance port security
 The Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico recently deployed its eighth mobile scanner, used to examine shipping containers for radiological material as they are transferred from one ship to another, the lab announced Aug. 14.
The Mobile Radiation Detection and Identification System makes it harder for terrorists to smuggle radioactive material, Greg Stihel of Sandia's Systems and Mission Assurance Department said in the announcement. Radiation detectors typically are positioned at port entrances and exits, meaning they are unable to scan transshipment containers, he said. Sandia's mobile scanner increases security without causing shipment delays that interfere with shipper or port profits. "If the system creates time delays, that costs shippers and port operators money, and the detectors won't get used," Stihel said in the announcement. MRDIS was developed under the National Nuclear Security Agency's Second Line of Defense program, according to the lab. Two prototypes were developed in 2006 and field-tested in Oman. NNSA ordered 12 of the systems after the field tests. Engineers are now producing a second generation of the mobile scanners. The first four scanners went to Panama last November; four others went to Oman. Sandia did not say where the remaining four are bound. Driving the mobile scanner "feels strange because it's so big, and because the operator sits sideways, facing the trucks going through the center," Stihel said. Trucks carrying containers pass through the scanner. "It is not as intuitive as you think," Rodney Wilson, director of Sandia's Nonproliferation and Cooperative Threat Reduction Center, said in the announcement. "Imagine being in the back seat of your car, on the passenger side, facing in, and trying to drive the car using joy sticks to turn and go forward and back, all while staring at a computer screen. Oh, and you are also 15 feet off the ground.," Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and Cincinnati-based DRS Technologies worked with Sandia on the project. For more:
- read the announcement Related Articles:
Cybersecurity overlooked in Port Security Grant Program
TSA defends TWIC pilot testing
Auditors warn about ending lifespan of radiation portal monitors in seaports
Coast Guard's WatchKeeper faces rejection in ports Read more about: Mobile Radiation Detection and Identification System MRDIS, Mobile Scanner
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4. Extreme weather increases CO2 by one-third
 Extreme weather driven by higher atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide is essentially dumping another 11 billion tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, equivalent to a third of global CO2 emissions per year, according to new research from Germany's Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry.
Carbon dioxide causes the earth to heat up and causes more extreme weather such as drought, heat waves, heavy rain and violent storms, the institute said in an announcement. An international team of researchers known as the CARBO-Extreme Project learned the extreme weather blocks plants from absorbing about 11 billion tons of carbon dioxide annually. That amount of carbon dioxide is "by no means negligible," Markus Reichstein, director of the biogeochemistry institute, said in the announcement. For one thing, he said, even more extreme weather can result. Extreme drought in particular significantly reduces the amount of carbon dioxide absorbed, Reichstein said, damaging trees and reducing their resistance to pests and fire. Forests also recover more slowly from fire or storm damage than an ecosystem such as grasslands, he said. The researchers, representing eight countries, plan additional studies to understand the impact of extreme events, including those occurring once in 1,000 or 10,000 years, according to Michael Bahn or the University of Innsbruck. For more:
- read the announcement Related Articles:
Multitude of ways California is feeling the effects of climate change
NOAA: 2012 was among warmest years and sea level was at record high
Climate engineering immature, says GAO Read more about: Max Planck Institute, carbon dioxide emissions
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5. Nuclear security is 'unrealistic,' paper says
The underlying assumptions behind U.S. nuclear security are unrealistic, a paper from the University of Texas says. The hypothetical attacks that nuclear facilities must protect against vary based on what materials they contain, their location, and which government agency regulates them--the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Energy Department or the Defense Department. But the government does not have accurate knowledge of the consequences of various potential attacks, says the paper (.pdf), published Aug. 15. Additionally, "the fact that certain acts of nuclear terrorism are easier to perpetrate, or are believed to have lesser value for terrorists, does not necessarily mean that the attacking force would be less robust," it says. In general, the goal shouldn't be to make the risk of death and destruction equally low at all facilities, the paper says, but to make the risk of nuclear terrorism as close to zero as possible, because the consequences would be so severe. Alan Kuperman, a professor at the university's Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs and the coordinator of the school's Nuclear Proliferation Prevention Project, co-authored the paper, which was primarily researched and written by Lara Kirkham, a researcher at the NPPP. Other criticisms of the government's approach to nuclear security include that intelligence about which facilities are likely to be targeted is unreliable. Also, private facilities face different requirements from government-run facilities, leaving the private ones incapable of defending against a "maximum, credible, non-state adversary," the paper says. The agencies that manage or regulate nuclear facilities rely on a "design-basis threat"--a profile of the type, composition and capabilities of an adversary--to create safeguards for them. "So long as the U.S. government employs a DBT, it should be the same for all U.S. nuclear facilities--whether public or private--that pose catastrophic risks," the paper says. For more:
- download the paper, "Protecting U.S. Nuclear Facilities from Terrorist Attack: Re-assessing the Current 'Design Basis Threat' Approach" (.pdf) Related Articles:
Los Alamos nuclear facilities vulnerable to earthquakes, wildfires
Podonsky: NNSA security fixes often just temporary
Aging security at Pantex plant, warn auditors Read more about: DoD, NRC
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Also Noted > London police urged to explain detention of reporter Glenn Greenwald's partner. Article (WaPo)
> White House taps McAfee CTO for DHS cybersecurity post. Article (WSJ)
> Asylum seekers at southwest border double. Article (AP via ABC News)
> California Republicans turn to immigration to fight extinction. Article (Politico)
> Bare trees are a lingering sign of Hurricane Sandy's high toll. Article (NYT) And Finally... Are bottomless drinks good business? Article (The Atlantic) > Webinar: Federal cloud computing adoption, a look back and forward - Sept. 10, 2 PM ET / 11 AM PT When adopting cloud computing, federal agencies can chose to adopt public, private or hybrid options. During this webinar, we'll discuss real examples of how federal agencies have handled cloud computing. Register now. > Webinar: Federal security concerns and the cloud - Now Available On-Demand Watch this interactive FierceGovernmentIT webinar that explores the extent to which data security concerns act as a cloud computing adoption obstacle, the extent to which the can be mitigated, and the resulting impacts those mitigations may have on use cases and deployment. Watch Today.
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Government and industry leaders will share their knowledge and thoughts at a conference designed to enlighten, inform and educate. Learn more and click to register. > International Cryptographic Module Conference - September 24-26, 2013 - * Holiday Inn Gaithersburg, MD - Published: August 7, 2013 ICMC 2013 will convene experts from around the world to address the unique challenges faced by those who produce, use, and test cryptographic modules that conform with standards such as the FIPS 140-2 standard. The conference will help to foster a focused, organized community of users. ICMC will cover the technical design problems to meet the standard, with a particular emphasis on the challenges posed as technology advances with respect to the current standard. Register today! > Predictive Analytics World - September 29-October 3 - Boston, Massachusetts Predictive Analytics World Boston is packed with the top predictive analytics experts, practitioners, authors and business thought leaders and focuses on concrete examples of deployed predictive analytics. Register or learn more!
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