The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration plans to update its information security program and move program planning forward for the follow-on Joint Polar Satellite System as recommended in a study by the Government Accountability Office.
In the study posted Tuesday, GAO noted that NOAA’s $11 billion JPSS program has experienced milestone delays, such as a two-year delayed delivery of a JPSS-1 instrument, and a cost growth of up to 16 percent for other components.
GAO also found that although NOAA has implemented key information security policies as the National Institute of Standards and Technology recommended, JPSS has not fully adopted half of the recommended security controls and fully addressed vulnerabilities.
NOAA plans to deploy new JPSS satellites for data continuity, although the report has also indicated that the agency should work on a strategy to address a potential satellite data gap by further assessing the health and service life of the current satellites.