IS A NEW IT REVOLUTION BEGINNING IN FLINT?

FROM:  NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION
Igniting change in Vehicle City
Kettering University leads effort to improve city services in Flint, Michigan through high-speed networking

Flint, Mich., the former home of General Motors, is on the rebound these days. Leaders there believe they have hit on a winning formula--connecting the city's institutions to high-speed networks that support new, game-changing capabilities.

Through grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ), Flint is beginning to lay the groundwork for an information technology-driven transformation.

In June 2012, Flint was one of 16 initial cities that were part of US Ignite, a public-private partnership designed to capitalize on the possibilities of ultra-fast broadband networks and "ignite" the development of next-generation Internet applications and services with societal benefits.

Kettering University--formerly General Motors Institute--was designated the lead research institution for the city.

High-speed networking wasn't really on the radar of John Geske, a professor of computer science at Kettering University, before Flint joined US Ignite.

"I was busy running a computer science department and the last thing on my mind was networking applications," Geske said.

But because of the US Ignite award, he started attending application summits and other meetings and realized the possibilities that were available at his doorstep.

"The community that you start to create and the contacts you make are just invaluable," he said.

Connected schools

Phase One of making the city a gigabit hotbed involved taking a step back and uncovering what was already available in the community.

Geske learned that the entire city school system, as well as the schools in 21 schools districts in neighboring Genesee County, had formed the GenNET consortium in 1995 and were already connected by a high-speed, fiber-optic network. Moreover, the schools were connected to the city's four higher education institutions via the Flint Area Network for Educational Telecommunications.

With these capabilities in place, students in the school district experienced unique learning opportunities. For instance, students were able to remotely control an exploratory submarine in real time near the Barrier Reef and communicate with astronauts on the space shuttle. Genesee County students were even able to dissect a sheep's brain via a telemedicine class remotely led by a doctor at Northern Michigan University.

"The GenNET fiber-optic network allows us to reduce the cost of technology services while providing a powerful platform for delivering virtual learning," said Luke Wittum, executive director of Technology and Media Services in the Genesee Intermediate School District.

US Ignite extended this already capable base and provided dedicated 10 gigabit-per-second network connections to the universities and libraries in Flint and to other gigabit cities around the nation, on unique, programmable hardware.

With ultra-high-speed, high-capability Information Technology in place, technology leaders hope to leverage the existing fiber-optic networks to provide immersive virtual reality learning to all students in Flint and Genesee County.

"What if a student could step inside of a human cell, stand at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, or visit a historical place?" Wittum asked. "This opportunity could make learning more engaging and also provide some students who may have never been outside of the county or state to visit another part of the world."

Safer, smarter neighborhoods

Flint areas schools aren't the only target for transformation through high-speed networks. Early meetings with city officials and university representatives determined that public safety could be a focus of the US Ignite networking projects, too.

Together with stakeholders in the Mayor's office and the university, they envisioned a university corridor where improved surveillance, responsive lighting and targeted policing could lower crime and encourage development.

"US Ignite provides the city of Flint with opportunities to make the community safer by automating utilities--turning on all lights in an area where a crime has been reported, for example, or by giving law enforcement access to high-speed, real-time, high-definition video on demand," said Kettering University President Robert K. McMahan.

"We may not be able to have a full smart city yet, but a smart neighborhood is entirely possible," noted Geske.

These forms of "smart policing" rely on networks of sensors, cameras and analytical tools that require fast networking and access to powerful computing. The Kettering project has these in the form of GENI hardware.

GENI is an NSF-funded experimental, ultra-high-speed, programmable networking testbed that allows researchers to test new networking ideas at-scale.

There are more than 180 GENI sites around the world--and Flint is one of a few cities that is already leveraging its GENI connections to advance application concepts and prototypes for public benefit and in support of the US Ignite initiative.

In part because of the strength of the existing resources and the community of stakeholders they had developed, Kettering University was awarded a $1 million grant in 2014 from the U.S. Department of Justice as part of DoJ's Byrne Criminal Justice Innovation Program. The grant helps Flint develop and implement sustainable crime prevention strategies in the University Avenue Corridor in order to convert the neighborhood into a vibrant region. One strategy is data-driven policing.

"There are lots of pockets of information and it's hard for a researcher to gather it all together to find out if there are certain patterns," said Geske. "Once you pinpoint that, you can look at the area, figure out what's going on and decide what to do."

In an early collaboration with Flint police, Kettering researchers identified a particular pattern of criminal activity along the corridor. In this case, using data analytics, the university identified a property as a magnet for robberies--and purchased and revamped it to reduce crime in the area.

Geske hopes to enable this kind of smart policing citywide by building a cloud computing platform that enables the city to amass crime statistics and provides public access to the data.

In the future, officials imagine the avenue wired with lighting, air quality sensors, smart lighting and even autonomous vehicles or drones connected to the high-speed network. The GENI equipment will be used as a testbed to explore some of these possibilities.

Networked care

A third focus area for Flint is medicine, where Kettering is spearheading a partnership with the University of Michigan-Flint and Mott Community College, as well as with three major medical centers near the city.

Through this partnership, students, faculty, clinicians and researchers in the Flint area will be able to collaborate with instructors from around the country and have direct access to new tools to provide exceptional patient care. Officials even hope to use high-speed networking technologies to bring specialists together in a virtual office to make diagnoses.

With such technology in place, President McMahan says "individual patients seeking medical care at our partners in Flint will always have access to the latest advancements in healthcare no matter where in our country they originate or reside."

With the city as a testbed for creative technological solutions to civic problems, it will be interesting to see how advanced IT can impact education, policing and health care in the city.

Said Erwin Gianchandani, deputy division director for computer and network systems at NSF, "Pilot projects like those in Flint and other cities across the country are demonstrating the value of ultra-high-speed, programmable networks in our communities and helping the nation envision the possibilities of a faster, safer, smarter future Internet."

-- Aaron Dubrow, NSF (
-- John Geske, Kettering University (
Investigators
John Geske
Yunsheng Wang
Related Institutions/Organizations
Kettering University
Raytheon BBN Technologies Corp.

DEFENSE ADVANCED RESEARCH PROJECTS AGENCY HOSTS DARPA DEMO DAY 2014

FROM:  U.S. DEFENSE DEPARTMENT 

Right:  The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Big Mechanism program aims to leapfrog state-of-the-art big data analytics by developing automated technologies -- illustrated by this information flow chart -- to help explain the causes and effects that drive complicated systems such as diseases like cancer. DARPA graphic.


DARPA Innovations Advance National Security
By Cheryl Pellerin
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, May 21, 2014 – The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Information Innovation Office, or I2O, is hosting DARPA Demo Day 2014 in the Pentagon’s courtyard today to highlight the agency’s ongoing contributions to preserving and expanding the Defense Department’s information technology superiority.

The Pentagon event has a focus on information technology and it showcases more than 100 projects that push for game-changing improvements to national security. IT, according to DARPA, is a key enabler for DOD and has been a focus area for DARPA since its establishment in 1958.

“The information revolution has been a huge boon to society,” I2O Director Daniel Kaufman said, adding, “but our growing dependence on information networks also means that information is today’s tactical and strategic high ground, increasingly targeted by adversaries from everyday criminals to networked terrorists who would do our nation mortal harm.”

Kaufman said I2O’s mission is to ensure the safety and reliability of essential information technologies against challenges the nation faces today and those in the future.

DARPA contributions include its development and prototyping of technology for what is now the Internet.

The DOD currently enjoys IT superiority, according to a DARPA press statement, but that superiority can’t be taken for granted.

The Pentagon event showcases an array of DARPA projects designed, as DARPA officials describe it, to quickly and profoundly change the way the nation addresses growing national security challenges posed by the information revolution and by the increasing global availability of sophisticated information technologies.

DOD officials, defense contractors and invited public-sector innovators heard DARPA program managers and project principals describe their progress toward game-changing advances in areas such as cybersecurity, networked warfighter systems, language translation and decision support.

Together, according to the DARPA statement, the displays pointed to a future in which networks will be increasingly resilient to natural and human-launched threats. And in that future, lightning-fast detection of emergent, information-related irregularities, including potential threats, will inform equally fast correctives and countermeasures.

Advanced data analysis, automation and fusion technologies will enable the timely extraction of actionable, previously inaccessible insights from mountains of raw information, DARPA says, and enable sharing those insights through cutting-edge collaboration, data visualization and user-interface technologies.
The event highlighted 29 programs in four categories. Cyber includes approaches to maintaining IT systems safety and security. Big Data includes tools to facilitate the use of information at scale.

Language includes translation technologies to help warfighters communicate more effectively in foreign-language environments. And warfighter apps, which include other initiatives of great interest to DOD, such as the Revolutionizing Prosthetics program in DARPA’s new Biological Technologies Office.

Among the I2O programs on display were the following:
-- DARPA Cyber Grand Challenge, CGC: To be launched this summer, CGC will be the first-ever tournament for testing fully automatic network defense systems. The competition’s goal is to vastly improve the speed, scale and effectiveness of IT security against escalating cyber threats.

-- High-Assurance Cyber Military Systems, HACMS: Seeks to protect networked, embedded IT systems from cyberattack by creating semi-automated systems that build software according to formal methods and check that the created code is secure and works as intended.

-- Big Mechanism: Aims to leapfrog state-of-the-art big-data analytics by developing automated technologies to help explain causes and effects that drive complicated systems. Initial efforts will focus on research relating to cancer pathways.

-- Memex: Seeks to develop next-generation search technologies and revolutionize the discovery, organization and presentation of public-domain search results. Initially, DARPA intends to develop Memex to address fighting human trafficking.
-- Broad Operational Language Translation, BOLT: Seeks to create new techniques for automated translation and linguistic analysis that can be applied to informal text and speech common in online and in-person communication.
At DARPA, Kaufman said, “we help make the tools of the information revolution more powerful and useful, not just for those who ensure our security but also for the people and nations they protect.”

DOD COMMUNICATIONS CHALLENGES OUTLINED

FROM: U.S. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE

Official outlines challenges in securing DOD communications

by Nick Simeone
American Forces Press Service

6/13/2013 - WASHINGTON (AFNS) -- The threat of a cyberattack that would disrupt or deny connectivity is one of many information technology challenges the Defense Department faces, the Pentagon's chief information officer said here June 12.

"There's nothing that we do in DOD from the standpoint of mission security that does not rely on connectivity," Terri Takai told an audience of private-sector leaders and government information technology communities at the FedTalks 2013 conference.

Everyone seems to take connectivity for granted, Takai said, but maintaining it requires security measures, and a cyberattack could circumvent those measures.

"We have to think about how we will operate when that connectivity is disrupted or denied," she said.

It's an enormous challenge. With a budget of $39 billion spread across all four military branches and 40 defense agencies, Takai is charged with providing secure communications for the entire military.

"I support over 3.3 million people," she said. "We're located in 153 countries, and many of those countries are a challenge for being able to get connectivity. And then we're probably in more than 6,000 locations all over the world."

In addition to cyber threats, Takai said, the Defense Department's information technology community also must work through shrinking budgets, challenges posed by nations or groups that DOD partners with, and changing missions.

For example, she said, the Defense Department's shift toward the Asia-Pacific region means fewer U.S assets on the ground and more in the air and at sea. This requires new arrangements for a range of communications, including increased use of satellites, both government and commercial.

"It changes the dynamics of the way we look at how we provide communication capabilities," Takai said, and new partners in the region will have to be included in secure communications networks.

"That's a whole different group of countries to work with," she added, "and for me it's a whole different set of countries to be thinking about, 'How am I going to connect in a very secure way?'"

INFORMATION TECH AND THE FUTURE OF U.S. DOD'S TRANSCOM

Personnel assigned to the 618th Tanker Airlift Control Center coordinate with aircrews, maintenance personnel and aerial porters around the world from the unit's operations floor at Scott Air Force Base, Ill. The center makes global reach a reality by transforming requirements into effective missions through the planning, tasking and execution of a fleet of more than 1,200 mobility aircraft in support of combat delivery and strategic airlift, air refueling and aeromedical evacuation operations around the world. DOD photo by Robert Fehringer

FROM: U.S. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE

IT Plays Central Role in Transcom's New Strategy
By Donna Miles
American Forces Press Service
SCOTT AIR FORCE BASE, Ill., Nov. 13, 2012 - Shaping itself for the future as it implements its new five-year strategy, U.S. Transportation Command is maximizing what one of its senior officers calls the ultimate enabler: information technology.

Information technology is the driver that keeps the wheels of Transcom's global transportation and distribution enterprise turning, Air Force Brig. Gen. Gregory J. Touhill, the command's director of command, control, communications and cyber systems, told American Forces Press Service.

"There is not one single organization in this command or its components that does not rely on information technology," said Touhill, Transcom's self-described "head geek."

"We share a lot of information in order to choreograph the many movements that Transcom makes ... on behalf of the nation," Touhill said. "And it is all reliant on getting the right information to the right people at the right time, in a trusted manner.

"In fact," Touhill added, "some would argue that information technology provides the fuel for this command."

Among those proponents is Air Force Gen. William M. Fraser III, Transcom's commander. He puts such a high emphasis on IT's value to the mission that he made IT management excellence one of the four pillars in his new strategy.

"As we look at our strategy of how we are going to get better to meet the demands of the future, it is all built upon a foundation of having solid information so that decision makers have the right information to make informed and valued decisions in a spirit of collaboration and partnership," Touhill said.

That requires rethinking the whole way Transcom approaches information technology. One of the first steps is evaluating the 77 major IT systems Transcom's headquarters and its components currently operate across 16 discrete networks, to the tune of about $500 million a year.

"We are working as a team with our components and within the headquarters here, looking at opportunities to consolidate where it makes sense, retire some old and inefficient systems and perhaps birth some new capabilities using some of the latest techniques and technologies," Touhill said.

Some of the systems being evaluated, like a logistics system from 1972 used to maintain Transcom's inventories, still perform beautifully, he said. But many could work just as well -- even better and more securely -- if they were migrated onto platforms that also cost less to operate and maintain.

They key to the whole initiative, Touhill said, is standardization: standardized views, information exchanges, architectures and delivery.

Transcom relies on multiple portals to exchange vast quantities of information with customers and the components and commercial partners that provide the aircraft, ships, ground vehicles and other assets that support the mission.

Adopting a standard language -- most likely, the universally recognized Extensible Markup Language, or XML -- would reduce maintenance costs while streamlining the process. Touhill said it also would better position Transcom to leverage industry-wide best practices.

Similarly, Touhill wants to introduce more Web technologies to replace the service-oriented architectures used to link these multiple communications systems. This could dramatically reduce costs, he said, eliminating the need to maintain interfaces that cost about $100,000 apiece to maintain each year.

Air Mobility Command, Transcom's air component, already has started adopting this practice, one that's been proven across the business world, Touhill noted.

Meanwhile, Transcom is exploring ways to standardize the way it delivers information, eliminating the need for separate infrastructure and support stovepipes for individual IT systems.

"Technology has evolved to the point now where we can host multiple systems and multiple capabilities on a reduced number of platforms," Touhill said. "Furthermore, we believe that we will get greater operational effectiveness by putting our development, test and production environments in synchronization with each other, and virtualizing across the entire enterprise."

In simple terms, that means using the same systems throughout its processes. It also involves running multiple operating systems at the same time using a single central processing unit -- a cornerstone of the Defense Department's Joint Information Environment initiative, which is designed to enhance information-sharing.

"We are not going to go out and buy a separate computer for every single system," Touhill said. "Rather, technology allows us to host multiple applications and systems, all on the same box."

One of the challenges in implementing Transcom's five-year strategy is that many of the best solutions haven't yet been invented. So any plan for moving forward has to be flexible enough to incorporate new technologies as they are introduced.

"We are not going to go chase the latest fad just because it is out there," Touhill said. "We certainly will be monitoring all the new and latest technologies, but we are only going to invest in those that can demonstrate great value to the mission."

"And ultimately, that is what IT is all about: providing value -- to the mission, to the taxpayer and to our customers," he said. "There is great power in the capabilities that information technology provides."

JUSTICE DEPARTMENT ALLEGES U.S. COMPANY DISCRIMINATED AGAINST U.S. CITIZENS

FROM:  U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
Justice Department Files Lawsuit Against New Jersey Information Technology Company for Retaliation
The Justice Department filed a lawsuit today against Whiz International LLC, an information technology staffing company in Jersey City, N.J., regarding allegations that the company violated the anti-discrimination provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) when it terminated an employee in retaliation for expressing opposition to Whiz’s alleged preference for foreign nationals with temporary work visas.

The complaint alleges that the company directed an employee that served as a receptionist and a recruiter, to prefer certain noncitizens in its recruitment efforts and then terminated the employee when she expressed discomfort with excluding U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents from consideration. The anti-discrimination provision prohibits employers from retaliating against workers who oppose a practice that is illegal under the statute or who attempt to assert rights under the statute.

“Employers cannot punish employees who try to do the right thing and take reasonable measures to shed light on a practice they believe may be discriminatory,” said Thomas E. Perez, Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division. “Employers must ensure that their practices conform to the anti-discrimination provision of the INA, and retaliation will not be tolerated.”

The complaint seeks a court order prohibiting future discrimination by the respondent, monetary damages to the employee, as well as civil penalties.

The Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices (OSC) is responsible for enforcing the anti-discrimination provisions of the INA, which protect U.S. citizens and certain work-authorized individuals from citizenship status discrimination.  The INA also protects work-authorized individuals from national origin discrimination, over-documentation in the employment eligibility verification process and retaliation.