Homeland Security and Justice

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Transformation Initiative

Homeland Security Department

• Estimated value: $500 million
• Phase: Solicitation expected early 2007
• Expected award date: Fall 2007

Here's how the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services bureau describes its IT environment: "nonstandard, outdated infrastructure supporting more than 60 minimally integrated applications." And that's just the start. The agency, which largely relies on application fees paid by immigrants to support itself, still uses paper forms and batch processing of applications. As a result, some immigrants wait "years for benefit decisions," according to an agency request for information released in 2004. USCIS officials want to change all that through a massive modernization, but they're still finishing up a concept of operations document laying out the next steps. Stay tuned for it in late 2006, say agency officials.

Next Generation Identification System

FBI Criminal Justice Information Services Division

• Estimated value: $200 million
• Phase: Solicitation expected early 2007
• Expected award date: Fall 2007

The FBI's criminal justice information services division conducts more than 17 million fingerprint checks annually (about 50,000 prints daily) for federal, state and local law enforcement agencies, using a system deployed in 1999. Even a single mistake can be costly and embarrassing, how-ever, as in the bureau's false match of Portland, Ore., attorney Brandon Mayfield's prints to evidence from the 2004 Madrid terrorist bombings. The system was a quantum leap forward when it was put in place, but FBI officials say it's time for a major upgrade that improves accuracy, search capability, automation and interoperability with the biometric systems at DHS. The system contains data on about 45 million people.