Mr. Ehrler was a featured speaker at Virtual Connecting Technology (CT) Fall 2001. This update has been edited from Mr. Ehrler's presentation at CT.
Introduction
The Navy Marine Corps Intranet (NMCI) contract was awarded to EDS and its Information Strike Force (ISF) partners on October 6, 2000, and since then we have achieved many significant milestones along the way. The ISF has assumed responsibility for about 42,000 seats at 29 sites – about 10 percent of the eventual total that NMCI will comprise. About 80 percent of the work has gone to Small Business. This is significantly more than the contract requires and EDS has received its full incentive award for meeting that requirement. In July 2001, the first NMCI Network Operations Center (NOC) was opened in Norfolk, Virginia, followed by the second NOC, at San Diego, California, in August. These facilities are located in the two main Fleet concentration areas and will be the main hubs of NMCI. Eventually, there will be six regional NOCs throughout CONUS and Hawaii. These hubs provide service crucial to the operation of the network, such as help desk support, user administration, network monitoring and maintenance. Not only are these centers important to the redundancy of the network - if one NOC has operational problems the other can take control, but they also serve as the two points of contact for help desk support to the entire network. In addition, there are 16 server farms operational.
The initial complements of Sailors have reported for duty at the Norfolk and San Diego NOCs. Designed to maintain an in-house information technology [IT] ability within the Navy and Marine Corps, these billets will provide not only shore assignment opportunities but also state-of-the-art training and certifications that will be used in follow-on tours. And to the extent that their contributions to the operation of the NOCs reduces overhead and drives down costs, the Department of the Navy (DON) will share in those savings. Our civilian employees have also received a very good proposal from industry to help us deal with the transition. Of the 215 civilian employees affected so far, 45 have accepted positions with the ISF. Not one DON civilian employee has been involuntarily separated as a result of NMCI.
Summary of NMCI highlights include:
•Over 42,000 seats ordered in first increment
•ISF has assumed responsibility for running legacy networks for 42,000 users, or approximately 10% of users
•Sixteen NMCI server farms operational
•NOCs operational in Norfolk - 9 Jul 01 and San Diego - 6 Aug 01
•Initial complement of Sailors have reported to NOCs in Norfolk and San Diego
•Interim Authority To Connect to DISN granted - 14 Aug 01
–Supporting security analysis and testing completed
•215 civilian positions affected in first increment; 45 have taken positions with ISF. No employees involuntarily separated.
•PUSD (AT&L)/DoD CIO NMCI Decision Memorandum signed - 5 Sep 01
•First NMCI desktops cutover at NAF Washington - 7 Sep 01
•Cutover commenced at NAS Lemoore - 3 Oct 01
Security
On August 13, 2001, the Navy Designated Approval Authority (DAA) granted Interim Authority to Operate to the Norfolk and San Diego NOCs. Following this decision, the Defense Information Systems Agency Security Accreditation Group (DSAWG) granted these facilities an Interim Authority to Connect (IATC) to the Unclassified but Sensitive Internet Protocol Router Network (NIPRNET) on August 16. To attain these certifications, the Program Manager and NMCI DAA had to provide the Defense Information Systems Network (DISN) DAAs with a full security testing report, risk assessment analysis and a system security authorization agreement. Satisfied with the reports received, the DISN DAA granted the NOCs and Help Desks the IATC, which allows NMCI to communicate with Joint