The average number of breaches to personally identifiable information on the Air Force Network has decreased, but there is still much work to do to prevent future incidents, said Gen. William Shelton, head of Air Force Space Command. “We’ve all got to work harder to eliminate PII violations,” said Shelton in a Jan. 3 command release. In November, a single PII breach affected more than 5,000 individuals, said Shelton. In the same month, AFSPC officials implemented lockout procedures for individuals found to have inappropriately transmitted PII. That change is making a difference. From May to October 2013, the Air Force averaged approximately 3.3 reports of breaches affecting 1,935 members each day; since launching the new policy, the average has dropped to approximately 2.7 reports, affecting 991 members daily, states the release. “The most common violations we are seeing are people transmitting personnel rosters from .mil to .com addresses and vice versa,” said Col. Douglas Coppinger, vice commander of the 67th Cyberspace Wing, which monitors for PII violations. (Peterson report by Maj. Brooke Brander) (See also Securing the Air Force Network.)
Anduril and General Atomics will develop their Collaborative Combat Aircraft for the Air Force, beating out Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman, the service announced on April 24. But any of the non-selected companies can compete to actually manufacture the eventual design the Air Force said.