The industrial base of contractors in industry seeking to do business with the National Security Agency has mushroomed in recent years, according to an NSA acquisition official.
In 2001, only 140 contractors were eligible to compete for NSA contracts. Today, there are six thousand such contractors, said Deborah Walker of the NSA. She spoke at a contractor conference sponsored by the Defense Intelligence Agency last month.
The number of contractor facilities cleared by the NSA has grown from 41 in 2002 to 1265 in 2006, according to a chart that she presented in her talk (pdf).
The result is an increase in competitiveness and improved communication with industry, Ms. Walker indicated. “Partnerships with industry [are] vital to mission success,” she said.
See “Acquisition Resource Center,” presentation by Deborah Walker, National Security Agency, May 2007, Unclassified/FOUO.
Contractors now consume as much as 70% of U.S. intelligence spending, reported Tim Shorrock in Salon last week.
See, relatedly, “Senators Fault IC on Use of Contractors” by Laura Heaton, United Press International, June 6.
It is in the interests of the United States to appropriately protect information that needs to be protected while maintaining our participation in new discoveries to maintain our competitive advantage.
The question is not whether the capital exists (it does!), nor whether energy solutions are available (they are!), but whether we can align energy finance quickly enough to channel the right types of capital where and when it’s needed most.
Our analysis of federal AI governance across administrations shows that divergent compliance procedures and uneven institutional capacity challenge the government’s ability to deploy AI in ways that uphold public trust.
From California to New Jersey, wildfires are taking a toll—costing the United States up to $424 billion annually and displacing tens of thousands of people. Congress needs solutions.