Monday, May 22, 2000
By KIM DIXON
Bloomberg News
WASHINGTON -- The National Security Agency -- the most secretive U.S. intelligence organization -- is falling behind in its use of technology and should contract with cutting-edge private companies to ensure the nation's security, lawmakers said.
"They absolutely have to learn how to do business with the private sector," in areas including encryption, fiber optics, and cellular communications, said Representative Porter Goss, a Florida Republican who heads the House panel on intelligence. "There are tremendous opportunities here for private contractors."
Companies that make encryption products, such as Network Associates Inc. and Symantec Corp., could benefit and help intelligence agencies pull themselves out of their technology rut, lawmakers said.
The committee report comes as the agency is under attack for failing to keep pace with the explosion in the volume and sophistication of cellular phone traffic, e-mail, fiber-optic data transmission, and other communication systems.
The volume of e-mail messages, for instance, will continue to grow at a compound annual rate of more than 35 percent per year through 2002, according to the Gartner Group Inc., a global business technology adviser.
Given the flood of information available for analysis, the NSA must "make ruthlessly honest assessments about in-house development versus contracting out," a report by the House Select Committee on Intelligence said last week.
U.S. intelligence agencies are poorly managed and lack enough funds, the report said. Those flaws mean the NSA puts U.S. military and intelligence personnel in danger by failing to keep up with technological advances necessary to intercept the spy activities of other countries, the study said.
"A fair amount of U.S. software publishers can provide the [encryption] technology to the NSA," said Diane Smiroldo, vice president of the Business Software Alliance, a trade group, that represents leading U.S. software companies such as Microsoft Corp. and Novell Inc. "The vast majority of our members do have encryption products."
The most recent stumble at the agency was a crash of its computer system in January, which was "not the result of a terrorist attack or a hacker" but a use of "outdated information technology" and a lack of expertise, the House report said.
U.S. intelligence "finds itself under-funded and under-appreciated where there is obviously a need with bombs having gone off, Osama bin Laden existing and India firing nuclear tests we don't know about," Goss, a former CIA agent, said.
Bin Laden was indicted last year in connection with the bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa in 1998, and India's testing of nuclear weapons that year caught U.S. policymakers off guard.
The report says the NSA has failed to keep up with the explosion of information -- via electronic mail and fiber-optic lines, for example.
"Each type of communication -- radio, satellite, microwave, cellular, cable -- is becoming connected to all the others," the report said. "Unfortunately, NSA's culture has evolved so that is seemingly incapable of responding in an integrated fashion."
Observers of U.S. intelligence efforts agree. "Conditions have been allowed to lapse" at intelligence agencies, and they "definitely need [an] upgrade," said Steven Aftergood, director of the project on government security for the Federation of American Scientists.
President Harry Truman created the National Security Agency by an executive order in 1952 to direct communications and electronic intelligence using cryptology -- code making and breaking. Yet, since the end of the Cold War, the agency has struggled to find its role, analysts said.
For example, commercial vendors make cheaper and superior satellite imagery -- detailed battlefield maps made with spy satellite photos.
The House report said that in imagery intelligence, "we are still faced with totally inadequate systems planning and investment."
The NSA, responding to the report, said it is undertaking a series of reforms focusing on its acquisition process and information technology, although the agency would not elaborate.
"Doing what needs to be done for the nation's security does not come without cost," the NSA said in a statement.
The Clinton administration had no immediate comment.
The House report will be part of the intelligence spending authorization bill that will go to the floor in the next few days.
Budget figures for intelligence agencies are classified, although experts estimate NSA's budget runs about $3.5 billion, according to Jeff Richelson, a private intelligence analyst and author of the "U.S. Intelligence Community," a guide to spy agencies.
The House approved slightly more than the Clinton administration asked for, although Goss complains that Clinton didn't make it a higher priority in his budget. "If there is a leadership problem, it lays at the White House," Goss said.
The House report recommends more funds for longer-term strategic planning and to hire more spies.
"It's harder and harder to get good people in the technical intelligence agencies," with challenges and pay increasing in Silicon Valley, Richelson said.
Lt. Gen. Michael Hayden, NSA's director, is "fully aware of these problems," Richelson said, adding that it will take years to determine whether his leadership will yield progress.