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GCN Home > 08/18/03 web stories

Defense to test ID-checking prototype

By Dawn S. Onley, GCN Staff

The Defense Department in October will begin testing a prototype credential-checking system.

The pilot will help DOD’s Directorate of Information Assurance and Defense Manpower Data Center develop a system that can validate the identities of people trying to gain access to military installations and contractor facilities where Defense work is performed.

The DOD center, which oversees the Defense databases storing identity information, will work with Northrop Grumman Corp. on the test. The directorate, within the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Networks and Information Integration, is paying $500,000 for the test, which will run through March.

Northrop Grumman and a team of vendors developed the Defense Cross-Credentialing Identification System under a proof-in-concept project for the department. The DCIS prototype will process smart cards issued under DOD’s Common Access Card program as well as other standardized IDs in use at the agencies and contract sites participating in the prototype test.

“DCIS will provide a vital service for force protection,” said Wood Parker, vice president and general manager of the government IT division for Northrop Grumman mission systems group.

Northrop Grumman will administer tests at vendor and Defense facilities in Maryland and Virginia and at DOD’s Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M., and Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio.



More news on related topics: Defense IT, IT in Action, IT Security



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