FCW Insider: Jan. 14

The Department of Housing and Urban Development is failing to safeguard and manage more than 1 billion records containing personally identifiable information, according to a management alert from the agency's internal watchdog. Adam Mazmanian has more.

A State Department official suggested the U.S. could seek to limit intelligence sharing with allies who use Huawei products for 5G, but stopped short of endorsing a legislative ban. Derek B. Johnson takes a look.

The Department of Energy is putting out $625 million in funding for quantum computing research in a bid to attract multi-disciplinary teams to tackle some of the persistent problems with developing the new technology. Mark Rockwell explains.

Officials from the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of Health and Human Services' Office of the Inspector General explained how data management mandates in recent legislation are helping agencies. Get more from Lia Russell.

Quick Hits

*** Attorney General William P. Barr called on Apple to unlock two iPhones belonging to a member of the Saudi Royal Air Force accused of murdering three U.S. sailors and wounding eight others in at attack at Pensacola Naval Air Station. Second Lieutenant Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani was on a training course at the base when he went on a shooting spree, which Barr characterized as an act of terrorism.

The call to Apple to unlock the phones revives a debate on encryption between law enforcement and industry. The Justice Department has long held that manufacturers and app developers need to supply law enforcement with a means of bypassing encryption.

"This situation perfectly illustrates why it is critical that investigators be able to get access to digital evidence once they have obtained a court order based on probable cause," Barr said a Jan. 13 press conference.

*** A bill to pilot new technologies to protect the nation's pipelines and natural gas facilities from cyber threats would cost $64 million through 2024, according to a Congressional Budget Office estimate. The Pipeline and Liquid Natural Gas Facility Cybersecurity Preparedness Act would direct the Department of Energy to develop and test advanced cybersecurity technologies and establish curricula to help develop a physical security and cybersecurity workforce for the energy sector. According to the estimate, developing the physical infrastructure and technical tools needed to run the pilots would cost about $45 million, while the remaining $19 million would pay for 30 new employees to establish policies, procedures, workforce development curricula and coordinate response activities throughout the energy sector.

*** The Defense Innovation Unit is looking for a new capability to combine public, private and open source cyber threat data. The goal is to provide cross-cutting situational awareness, analysis and insight about malicious cyber activity. Submissions are being accepted through Jan. 17.