1.  The National Emergency Training Center has a continuing requirement to provide technical support to FEMA's Preparedness Training & Exercises Directorate, Exercises Division in the development, conduct, and evaluation of FEMA-sponsored, jointly-sponsored, and FEMA-supported exercises, games, simulations, table-top exercises, seminars, and workshops.

These events are in support of FEMA's mission in developing, implementing, and institutionalizing an all-hazard, risk-based exercise program, "Comprehensive Exercise Program (CEP)," to improve emergency management exercises. Contractor support will be more extensive when FEMA is the sponsor than when FEMA is co-sponsor or is supporting exercises sponsored by another organization.

Specific categories of technical support to be provided in support of the CEP under this requirement will include the following:

• FEMA-supported all-hazard State and Local exercises
• FEMA-sponsored exercises to test the Federal Response Plan
• FEMA-supported national and international exercises 
• Exercises that are either sponsored by, jointly sponsored, or supported by FEMA, and designed to test and evaluate specific plans, policies, and procedures for dealing with special events (i.e. Olympics) or with extraordinary events (i.e. terrorism)

• Large-scale Exercises --These may involve up to 2,000 participants from States, localities, Federal departments and agencies at the national and regional levels, voluntary organizations, industry, and foreign governments. These exercises may involve 24-hour per day operations and may last from 3 to 14 days. These exercises may be full-scale exercises with actual movement of emergency personnel and equipment, or they may be functional or a combination of these techniques. 
• Large-scale Games -- These games involve up to 450 participants from national, regional, State government levels, voluntary organizations, industry, and foreign governments. They vary in length from 5 to 14 days, and occur during 8-hour workdays. 
• Tabletop Exercises, Seminars, Workshops -- These events involve participants from the same groups as in the large-scale games and exercises, but involve fewer participants. These range from a 4-hour to a 3-day event, and require use of facilitators and recorders. 
• Simulations -- Simulation tools provide inter-active capabilities to enable emergency managers on the local, State, Regional, or Federal levels of government to practice decision making in an environment that allows them to visualize the results of their decisions/policies immediately, and to try various alternatives.

2.  The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has a requirement for systems engineering and technical support for enterprise IT development. These services will support the FEMA Information Technology Services (ITS) Directorate.

FEMA has the following requirements to support the Federal Emergency Management Agency Information Technology Services Directorate:

• Provide technical assistance for:

o Systems engineering
o Systems design
o Systems design review
o Systems integration
o Project management support activities
 
• Systems engineering and technical assistance (SETA) services will primarily support the execution of FEMA's IT Architecture, and will provide systems engineering oversight of all systems implementation activities within the Directorate, including, but not limited to:

o Systems development
o Automation of enterprise information services or enhancement of existing automated capabilities
o Conversion of applications to World Wide Web-compatible technologies
o Engineering services in support of communications systems used in disaster response, mitigation and recovery

3. The General Services Administration, Federal Technology Service (FTS), has a requirement for a Government Network Designed to Serve Critical Government Functions (GOVNET). 

The General Services Administration, Federal Technology Service (FTS), has a requirement for a Government Network Designed to Serve Critical Government Functions (GOVNET). The General Services Administration, at the request of the Executive Office of the President of the United States, and the newly designated Advisor for Cyberspace Security, and in support of National Security goals established by the President, is seeking information from industry that will assist in the development and deployment of a special telecommunications network, GOVNET. 

GOVNET will be a private Internet Protocol (IP) network shared by government agencies and other authorized users only. GOVNET will provide connectivity among users to a defined set (to be determined) of service delivery points. There will be no interconnections or gateways to the Internet or other public or private networks. This applies to any network management, control, and maintenance functions for GOVNET as well. Initially, GOVNET will provide private intranet data connectivity within the contiguous 48 United States (CONUS). GOVNET will provide commercial-grade voice communications capabilities within the network among specified users using the data network components and protocols. Voice services to be supported will include, but not be limited to, conferencing and multicast/broadcast.

GOVNET will support critical government functions and will be immune from malicious service and/or functional disruptions to which the shared public networks are vulnerable (i.e., so-called "cyber attacks"). GOVNET will provide the highest levels of reliability and availability including trunk and access diversity, and rapid response times for customer outages. GOVNET shall evolve to maintain technology and service currency with state of the art commercial services to the maximum extent practical. GOVNET will be operated on a 24/7 basis by the contractor. GOVNET will provide initial operational capabilities (IOC) within six months from contract award.

The Government encourages creativity and "outside the box" thinking in responses to this RFI. One possible solution would be to build a completely dedicated network based on dedicated physical fiber pairs and full path diversity. All hardware would be dedicated, including all transmission equipment, routers, switches, multiplexing equipment, network management and control equipment, etc. In addition, all management and operational personnel would be fully dedicated to the network.

The potential bidders include Abacus Technology Group, Accenture, ACS Government Systems, AMS, Anteon Corp., ASC, AT&T Government Markets, Boeing-Autometric, Booz Allen & Hamilton, CACI, CHM Inc., CISCO, CSC, Dell Computer Corp., Deloitte Consulting, DynCorp IS, EDS, General Dynamics, Genuity, Getronics, Harris Corporation GCSD, Hewlett-Packard Company, IBM, Keane Federal Systems Inc., KPMG Consulting, , Lockheed Martin Global Telecommunications, Lucent Technologies, Merrill Lynch, Motorola, NCR, Nortel Networks, Oracle, Qwest Government Solutions, Raytehon, SAIC, Secure Data Management Inc., SI International, SOZA, Sprint Government Systems Division, SRS, Sun Microsystems, Troy Systems Inc., TRW Systems, Telnet Inc., Unisys, Verizon Federal Network Division, and Worldcom.
The RFP Number is FTSJTB010001 and is titled “Government Network Designed To Serve Critical Government Functions (GOVNET).” The RFP is expected to be available in April, and the competition type is full and open.

4.  The US Department of Interior, United States Geological Survey (USGS) has a requirement for a Disaster Information Network (DIN). This requirement is also known as the National Hazard Information Strategy. 

The Disaster Information Network (DIN) is a multi-agency effort headed by the US Geological Survey that is seeking to integrate all types of information relevant to disasters and allow that information to be disseminated as necessary to aid in the recovery efforts of various types of disasters in the US and its territories.

The requirements are to aid the Government on establishing the network that will function over the Internet, allowing various users to communicate via text, graphics, voice, and video.

The DIN in the United States is part of the Global Disaster Information Network (GDIN). Other regional initiatives have been launched in Asia-Pacific, the Mediterranean, Africa, Australia, Nigeria and Kenya. GDIN is a voluntary, self-sustaining, non-profit association of countries, organizations, and professionals, from all sectors of society with an interest in sharing all types of disaster information. GDIN makes better use of existing and new technologies and develops institutional processes to promote global sharing of information about all disaster management functions between providers and users. It does this, in part, by providing a primary portal of access and linkage to existing national and international emergency- and disaster-management networks. GDIN also attempts to improve the effectiveness and interoperability of disaster information systems. GDIN also promotes and supports more timely access to disaster information by potentially affected communities and the general public through national and regional networks.

The DIN will take advantage of already-existing infrastructures at the various agencies involved in disaster recovery. The task force recommended formation of an Integrated Program Office with members from each of the key Federal agencies as a way to better integrate and coordinate Federal disaster information. The U.S. Geological Survey will host and chair the program office and the Administrator of NOAA will chair an Executive Committee that will oversee the office and set policy. 

The Integrated Program Office will work with other interested groups to form a Public/Private Partnership that will involve representatives of all stakeholders in design and implementation of a national disaster information system. Global partners will be sought to develop ways to expand the national system globally. 

The network will be used during all phases of emergency management including, mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery. It will provide information from all types of sources. The information will be made available rapidly and reliably to decision-makers and to others who are charged with taking action to reduce the loss of life and property damage before, during, and after the occurrence of a natural disaster. 

When the network is in place, this Disaster Information Network will be available on the World Wide Web. Users will be able to get the information they need to make critical decisions that may save lives and reduce or prevent property damage. 

When disaster strikes, DIN will support the high volume of requests for information that are sure to come, with critical users having access to government Intranets where access can be restricted to minimize overloading. Access may also be provided by satellite to avoid the flow of information being cut off by damage on the ground. 

The DIN network, by pooling existing resources toward the goal of faster, better coordinated communication, will be a key factor in reducing the cost of disasters and saving lives. The approximate annual value of savings from such a network is estimated at more than $1 billion. 

The Task force confronting the DIN challenge included representation from more than sixteen departments and agencies including: NOAA, NSF, DOD, OSTP, OMB, FEMA, NEC, EPA, DOA, Department of State, DOI, NASA, CIA, NSA and USGS. 
In 1997 the President's budget allocated $50 million toward the DIN program. However, due to lack of funding, industry sources now estimate the value of this opportunity at $8 million. 
Potential bidders include AMS, CSC, EDS, GTE, Lockheed Martin, SAIC, Unisys, PricewaterhouseCoopers  The RFP is titled “National Hazard Information Strategy (NHIS).” The RFP is expected to be available in March with an award in June, and the competition type is full and open.

5.  The U.S. General Accounting Office has a requirement for a contractor to conduct information security audits at federal agencies. 
The U.S. General Accounting Office has a requirement for a contractor to conduct information security audits at federal agencies. The audits generally include network vulnerability assessments with attempts to gain access to agency systems, commonly referred to as "penetration testing." The staff must understand the vulnerabilities of and defenses needed for current computer and network technologies and how to assess systems for such vulnerabilities. 

The contractor shall provide training on the following topics, as well as existing courses and costs for such training. 

1. Understanding the Technology, including networking (Local Area Networks), internetworking (Internet and Wide Area Networks), operating systems, ports and services, protocols, and dial-in modems. 
2. Understanding the Problems to include information leakage, weak password controls, unpatched or outdated software, unnecessary or misconfigured services, excessive user privileges, excessive trust relationships, and inadequate logging and monitoring. 
3. Types of Attacks to include denial of service, sniffing, password cracking, spoofing, buffer overflows, and social engineering. 
4. Network Vulnerability Analysis to include penetration testing attack scenarios and tools and techniques. The tools and techniques are to include information gathering, standard operating system commands, port scanners, modem locators, data extraction tools, vulnerability scanners, sniffers and keyboard capture utilities, log analyzers, password crackers, and social engineering. Also, the training is to include demonstrations, and hands-on practice and exercises. 
5. Defense Techniques (How to "Prevent" and "Detect") to include mitigating controls against the attack scenarios and tools and techniques described in the Network Vulnerability Analysis section. 

6.  The Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) has an ongoing requirement for systems engineering, technical systems engineering, technical analysis and programmatic support in the planning and acquisition of National Security/Emergency Preparedness (NS/EP) Priority Services in the Public Switch Network (PSN). 

Requirements include knowledge and experience with: 

· NS/EP
· Disruptive threats
· Network stress and congestion concerns
· Employed technologies and next generation PSN technologies
· Queuing mechanisms
· Acquisition strategy development
· Implementation methods
· Related efforts/other issues of program management/cost reporting

The original solicitation for GETS was issued by the Defense Information Systems Agency, with input from the National Communications System (NCS) and the Defense Commercial Communications Office (DECCO). According to the Program Office, GETS should provide switched-voice telephone service that can be used for clear voice, secure voice, facsimile, and low speed data services. GETS will provide and/or use routing alternatives, priority service and other enhancements that do not exist for normal PSN calls. GETS will be available anywhere in the 50 states and the District of Columbia and will be capable of using all major Local Exchange Carrier (LEC) facilities, and selected Government or private facilities, systems and networks. GETS will also provide the capability for international access and egress through the PSN gateways. GETS should be capable of using all major local exchange carrier facilities and provide access to overseas telephone systems through US international gateways.

The total value of the current contracts held by AT&T, DynCorp, Sprint, and MCI Worldcom is approximately $40 million.  The RFP is titled “Government Emergency Telecommunications Service Recompete (GETS SETA).” The RFP is expected to be available in December of 2003 with an award in May of 2004, and the competition type is full and open.

7. The International Sociological Association Research Committee on
Disasters (IRCD):  has a session under the categories of Other Groups at the
American Sociological Association Annual Meeting in Chicago, Illinois, August
16-20.  The topic is: Individual and Group Responses to the attack on
the World Trade Center.  Persons interested in submitting a paper should
send a one page abstract to BOTH the organizer of the session, E. L.
Quarantelli (elqdrc@udel.edu) and the chair of the session, Gary Webb
(webbgr@okstate.edu) by April 30 at the latest.  Papers presented at
the session will be automatically considered for later publication in a
special issue on the topic in the next 12 months, to be published by
the International Journal of Mass Emergencies and Disasters.