NPPD gets funding bump in Senate bill

A $50 billion DHS funding bill approved by the Senate Homeland Security Appropriation Subcommittee on May 24 includes just over $1.8 billion for the agency's National Protection and Programs Directorate. That's an increase of $183 million from fiscal 2016.

NPPD, the DHS cybersecurity arm, is responsible for protecting federal networks from cyberattack and data theft. The total includes $282 million for the agency’s Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation program, $480 million for intrusion detection on civilian federal networks and $14.2 million for cybersecurity education to train future cyber personnel.

The funding is significant at a time when NPPD has been moving to re-organize itself with a more operational, integrated approach to security both physical and cyber, instead of a continuing on as a static headquarters agency.

The reorganization includes a planned name change to Cyber Infrastructure Protection.

The plan, outlined in a hearing last October, also includes in upgrade for the directorate's National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center, the 24/7 hub for analyzing and disseminating cyber threat information. NCCIC would get its own office and align with the two multibillion-dollar DHS programs that have been deemed central to federal civilian cybersecurity: Einstein and CDM.

The office has also been working to coax more commercial companies to share cyberthreat information with it, so it can push it back out to other stakeholders to blunt big data breaches.

The reorganization plan still awaits congressional approval, however.