The Department of Homeland Security is looking for cybersecurity research projects and is paying for those efforts. An announcement from the agency and a recent Forrester report detail the offering. DHS is now making money available through the Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) process to fund research to solve some of the toughest cybersecurity issues.
DHS will award up to $95 million in phases over the next couple of years for projects which have a targeted research and development approach to creating new cybersecurity tools. The agency will be issuing several calls for proposals and white papers throughout that time.
Funding is available for tools in four tracks: data and privacy, distributed denial of service, mobile security, and cyber and physical system integration. According to the Forrester report, protecting personally identifiable information, measuring attacks and innovations in secure system design are all topping the list of interest areas for DHS.
“The amount of money is relatively small compared with the enormity of the cybersecurity problem, but it’s a step in the right direction, and research funds are available now,” writes Ed Ferrara, the author of the report.
DHS’ Enterprise Acquisition Gateway for Leading Edge Solutions II vehicle has also been almost entirely awarded. That vehicle will focus, among other things, on implementation of new and existing cybersecurity tools within the agency.
As CivSource has previously reported, there are also state level efforts underway to support research and development in cybsersecurity. Virginia’s Semper Secure program leverages its local university network along with nearby private companies to develop new cybersecurity tools. Similar efforts are also underway in Maryland, and Florida.
