Increase in Funding of Military Intelligence Cyber

Increase in Funding of Military Intelligence Cyber

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The US Defense Department (DoD) has been attributing growing importance to the military intelligence cyber field. This has been reflected by the DoD’s recent move to to beef up its cyber investments in the military intelligence arena by shifting some of its 2016 funds.

DoD moved nearly $20 million in funds from failing programs and contract savings early this summer to prioritize cyber, stated a DoD reprogramming action.  

A large portion of the funds will go to expanding the U.S. Army Intelligence and Security Command (INSCOM). The command, which conducts intelligence, security and information operations for military commanders, is set to receive about $6.2 million.

According to Federal News Radio, that money will go toward rapid research and development of low-density, non-standard technologies for cyberspace intelligence operations.

“Without immediate funding, INSCOM will not be able to conduct the necessary system engineering changes to optimize the cyberspace platform, develop and modify cyberspace payloads, or conduct developmental and operational testing evaluation that enables the cyberspace mission,” the reprogramming action stated.

DoD is also dropping money into the military services’ IT, cyber and intelligence funds.

Nearly $3 million was programmed to the Air Force to build out and update tailored intelligence IT enterprise architectures for U.S. Strategic Command, U.S. Africa Command, U.S. European Command and U.S. Northern Command.

Those architectures are needed to create the Intelligence Community Information Technology Enterprise or ICITE. The ICITE network connects the intelligence agencies and military services all over the world to a common IT system.

The Air Force is grabbing another $7.5 million for sensor and awareness systems. Funds will go to recapitalize Arc Storm system sites and upgrade system components. Those will be used to locate hostile electromagnetic interference of U.S. and allied satellites.

Other parts of the $7.5 million will go toward the Integrated Broadcast Service Enterprise, which provides near-real-time lethal warning and situational awareness to joint forces and coalition partners.

Finally, the reprogramming document gives $3 million to U.S. Cyber Command for classified purposes.