DHS is responsible for securing U.S. borders, in collaboration with other federal, state, local, and tribal entities. CBP, a component within DHS that is the lead agency for border security, is responsible for, among other things, preventing terrorists and their weapons from entering the United States and for interdicting persons and contraband crossing the border illegally. Within CBP, OFO is responsible for securing the border at ports of entry. Border Patrol is the CBP component charged with ensuring security along border areas between the ports of entry. Additionally, CBP’s OAM provides air and maritime support to secure the national border between the ports of entry, within maritime operating areas, and within the nation’s borders. ICE, a component within DHS, is responsible for the investigation and enforcement of border control, customs, and immigration laws. Within ICE, Homeland Security Investigations is responsible for disrupting and dismantling transnational criminal organizations engaged in smuggling and other cross-border criminal activities that seek to exploit the United States’ legitimate travel, trade, financial, and immigration systems for illicit purposes. DHS, CBP, and ICE components also coordinate their border security efforts with various other federal, state, local, and tribal entities. Figure 1 shows the Border Patrol sectors and ICE regions that represent geographic focus areas for tactical communications modernization upgrade projects, within the southwestern United States. There are 20 Border Patrol sectors across the United States. The 9 Border Patrol sectors that constitute the southwest border are San Diego, El Centro, Yuma, Tucson, El Paso, Big Bend, Laredo, Del Rio, and Rio Grande Valley. There are 26 ICE regions across the United States. The 5 ICE regions that constitute the southwest border are San Diego, Phoenix, El Paso, San Antonio, and Houston. Along the southwest border, CBP and ICE primarily operate on CBP’s radio network, which is controlled from and by NLECC, located in Orlando, Florida. A land mobile radio system is the primary voice communications tool for agents and officers to communicate with one another and with dispatchers and typically consists of the following: subscriber units: portable radios used for handheld operation and mobile radios used for vehicular operation; repeaters: can be portable or fixed and are used for retransmitting radio user transmissions to extend the range for radio communications; fixed site equipment: used to provide single-site and wide-area coverage for radio operation and includes routers, antennas, and towers, among other things; and key management facilities: used to provide Over-the-Air Rekeying (OTAR) to allow for encrypted communications. CBP’s OTAR system is located at the NLECC and generates, distributes, and manages national voice and data encryption keys for DHS agencies as well as other federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies. Figure 2 illustrates the basic components of a radio system. DHS radio systems must meet three key requirements, as described below. Narrowband mandate. In 1992, Congress passed the Telecommunications Authorization Act, title I of which established, within the Department of Commerce, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA).Secretary of Commerce for Communications and Information and, as relevant here, is tasked with advancing policies to foster effective use of NTIA is led by the Assistant the radio spectrum by the federal government. NTIA serves as the President’s principal advisor on telecommunications and information policy and manages federally assigned spectrum. NTIA has authority to issue rules and regulations as may be necessary to ensure the effective, efficient, and equitable use of spectrum both nationally and internationally. As part of its authority under 47 U.S.C. § 902(b)(2)(A), NTIA developed the Manual of Regulations and Procedures for Federal Radio Frequency Management (NTIA Manual), which is the compilation of policies and procedures that govern the use of the radio frequency spectrum by the U.S. government. Federal agencies must comply with the requirements set forth in the NTIA Manual. With respect to land mobile systems, pursuant to the NTIA Manual, narrowband frequency modulation (FM) is conventional FM with channel spacing of 12.5 kilohertz (kHz) or less, instead of 25 kHz. In accordance with the NTIA Manual, the federal government is required to foster the development of, and standards for narrowband land mobile systems, and institute plans to narrowband land mobile systems operating in certain bands according to a specific schedule. With certain exceptions, the channel bandwidth in certain frequency bands used by federal agencies for radio systems was to be reduced from 25 to 12.5 kHz, effective January 1, 2008.reduction in channel bandwidth is referred to as narrowbanding. Project 25. Since 1989, federal agencies have collaborated with public safety associations to establish common technical standards, called Project 25 (P25), for radio systems and devices. The purpose of these technical standards is to support interoperability among different radio systems, and to enable seamless communication across federal, state, and local agencies and jurisdictions. The P25 suite of standards is intended to promote interoperability by making radio systems and devices compatible regardless of the manufacturer. DHS Sensitive Systems Policy Directive 4300A, implementing DHS Management Directive 140- 01, Information Technology System Security, requires compliance with P25 standards for all DHS tactical wireless communication systems procurements. Advanced Encryption Standard (AES). DHS mandates the protection of all law-enforcement sensitive voice communications through the use of encryption. Encryption requires the use of an algorithm and a cryptographic key to encode messages at the origin and decode messages at the receiver. Federal departments and agencies are required to use encryption algorithms approved by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), such as the Advanced Encryption Standard used by DHS, for federal land mobile systems to protect sensitive information from being compromised. CBP and ICE have separate modernization efforts under each component’s respective TACCOM program. These modernization efforts are focused on upgrading existing radio systems equipment and infrastructure to comply with DHS requirements and expand coverage and capacity. CBP TACCOM. The CBP TACCOM modernization program, initiated in 2008, oversees the upgrade and modernization of existing outdated radio systems, to support more than 44,000 CBP law enforcement personnel in their daily operations across the nation. Through this program, CBP plans to modernize existing radio systems with digital technologies that provide AES while also meeting the federal narrowbanding mandate and P25 standards. For fiscal year 2009, CBP was appropriated $160 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act) funds for salaries and expenses, of which $100 million was for the procurement and deployment of new or replacement nonintrusive inspection systems, and $60 million was for procurement and deployment of TACCOM equipment and radios. Under the Recovery Act, CBP also received an additional $100 million for Border Security Fencing, Infrastructure, and Technology (BSFIT), for expedited development and deployment of border security technology on the southwest border. ICE TACCOM. The ICE TACCOM modernization program aims to replace aging legacy tactical communications networks with digital P25 compliant upgrades that provide AES encryption capabilities and meet the federal narrowband mandate to improve communications, interoperability, and coordination for ICE personnel during field operations. Pursuant to the Recovery Act, for fiscal year 2009, ICE received $20 million for automation modernization, for the procurement and deployment of tactical communications equipment and radios. In addition to Recovery Act funds, the TACCOM program is funded out of the Automation Modernization account for new investments and ICE base budget for operations and maintenance. The ICE TACCOM program received $10 million in fiscal year 2009 and $8 million in fiscal year 2011 from the Automation Modernization account and has not received any funding for its modernization efforts since 2011. DHS TACNET. In 2009, DHS estimated that it would cost $3 billion and take two decades to modernize the individual radio systems of all DHS components, including CBP and ICE. Accordingly, the DHS Acquisition Review Board mandated DHS components to work with the DHS Office of the Chief Information Officer to find alternatives to this approach. Conceived in 2011, the Tactical Communications Network (TACNET) is a separate program focused on developing next-generation communications technologies to meet DHS-wide interoperability needs, such as tactical broadband. However, as we have previously reported, while such a network would likely enhance interoperability, it would not support mission-critical voice capabilities for 10 or more years. TACNET is currently unfunded, but the DHS Acquisition Review Board granted approval to pursue the technical demonstration project on March 31, DHS intends for TACNET to eventually leverage this capability to 2011.consolidate individual DHS component TACCOM programs, including the components’ separate modernization projects. SAFECOM is a communications program that provides support, including research and development, to address interoperable communications issues. Led by an executive committee, SAFECOM has members from state and local emergency responders as well as intergovernmental and national public safety communications associations. DHS draws on this expertise to help develop guidance and policy. Among other activities, SAFECOM developed the Interoperability Continuum to assist emergency response agencies and policymakers to plan and implement interoperability solutions for data and voice communications. This tool identifies five critical success elements that must be addressed to achieve a sophisticated interoperability solution: governance, standard operating procedures, technology, training and exercises, and usage of interoperable communications. From 2009 through 2013, CBP completed full modernization projects in 4 of the 9 sectors that constitute the southwest border.