'NET Guard:' An idea still waiting for its time to come

Shortly after the 2001 terrorist attacks in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., took to the Senate floor to tout a novel idea.

"What this country needs," he said in a floor statement on improving emergency information systems, "is essentially a technology equivalent of the National Guard: a National Emergency Technology Guard-NET Guard-that in times of crisis would be in a position to mobilize our nation's information technology community to action quickly."

About a year later, the Senate passed a bill to create the NET Guard by voice vote, and President Bush ultimately endorsed the idea as part of the law creating the Homeland Security Department. But nine months after that act was signed, the volunteer IT teams exist only on paper and the idea appears to be on the backburner at Homeland Security.

The plan, spearheaded by Wyden and Sen. George Allen, R-Va., calls for the department to implement a system for forming local teams that would be willing to help in the event of a major systems or network crash. Homeland Security also is tasked with developing certification criteria that all volunteers must meet.

The statute that created the department, however, says only that the undersecretary for information analysis and infrastructure protection, a job currently held by Frank Libutti, "may" establish NET Guard and does not specifically demand it or put a timetable on creating it. Thus far, no action has been taken, apparently due to Homeland Security's preoccupation with the war in Iraq.

The Senate confirmed Libutti to the post in June, and a department spokesman could not provide an update on the status of NET Guard.

Wyden's spokesman said the senator certainly will "make a push to see that these provisions [of the law] are put into use. He worked to include these provisions because the private sector has an important role to play." But the spokesman added that Homeland Security is still a new department in the thick of reorganization.

He praised the willingness of companies and individuals "who wanted very much to help shoulder the burden faced by the emergency-response community" after the 2001 terrorist attacks and said that whether or not NET Guard exists, Wyden "believes that America should be ready to avail itself of those resources to supplement our first responders' efforts if a crisis strikes again."