The Federal Bureau of Investigation of the U.S. government, the FBI, was forced
ID: 3588468 • Letter: T
Question
The Federal Bureau of Investigation of the U.S. government, the FBI, was forced to scrap its $170
million virtual case file (VCF) management system. Official reports blamed numerous delays, cost
overruns, and incompatible software. But a deeper examination of the cause of this failure
uncovered issues of control, culture, and incompatible organizational systems.
Among its many duties, the FBI is charged with the responsibility to fight crime and terrorism. To
do so requires a large number of agents located within the Unites States and around the world. That
means agentsmust be able to share information among themselves within the bureau, and with other
federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies. But sharing information has never been standard
operating procedure for this agency. According to one source, “agents are accustomed to holding
information close to their bulletproof vests and scorn the idea of sharing information.” This turned
out to be a real problem in an investigation of DarkMarket, an Internet forum that connected buyers
and sellers so that they could exchange stolen information such as bank details and credit card
numbers.When both the FBI and Secret Service agents were investigating each other as criminals, it
took their British colleagues, who knew the secrets of both agencies, to avert a crisis.
Enter the FBI’s efforts to modernize its infrastructure, codenamed “Trilogy.” The efforts
included providing agents with 30,000 desktop PCs, high-bandwidth networks to connect FBI
locations around the world, and the VCF project to facilitate sharing of case information
worldwide. The FBI Director explained to Congress that VCF would provide “an electronic
means for agents to globally send field notes, documents, pieces of intelligence and other evidence
so they could hopefully act faster on leads.” It was designed to replace a paper-intensive process
with an electronic, Web-based process. With such a reasonable goal, why didn’t it work?
TheCIO of the FBI offered one explanation. He claimed that the FBI needed to change its culture.
“If the Bureau is ever going to get the high-tech analysis and surveillance tools it needs to. . . fight
terrorism, we must move from a decentralized amalgam of 56 field offices. . . to a seamlessly integrated
global intelligence operation capable of sharing information and preventing crimes in real-time.”
He added that they were also very distrustful of the technology, as well as others not only in other
organizations, but also within the FBI.
A former project manager at the FBI further explained, “They work under the idea that
everything needs to be kept secret. But everything doesn’t have to be kept secret. To do this right,
you have to share information.”
The VCF system has been shut down, but the CIO is working on a new approach. He is busy
trying to win buy-in from agents in the field so that the next case management system will work. In
addition, he is working to establish a portfolio management plan that will cover all of the FBI’s IT
projects, even those begun in decentralized offices. His team has been designing an enterprise
architecture that will lay out standards for a bureauwide information system. The Director of the
FBI has helped too. He reorganized the governance of IT, taking IT budget control away from the
districts and giving total IT budget authority to the CIO.
The FBI is building a new case management system called Sentinel in four phases. The first two
phases have been deployed and, according to theFederal IT dashboard, the project is on schedule and
on budget. The new system, according to the CIO, will include workflow, document management,
record management, audit trails, access control, and single sign-on. It will provide enhanced
information sharing, search, and analysis capabilities to FBI agents and also facilitate information
sharing with members of the law enforcement and intelligence communities. To manage the expectationsoftheagents,
theCIOplanstocommunicateoftenandsignificantlyincreasethetrainingprogram
forthenewsystem.TheCIOcommented,“Wewanttoautomatethosethingsthatarethemostmanually
cumbersomefor theagents sotheycanseethattechnologycanactuallyenhancetheirproductivity.That
is how to change their attitudes.”
PLEASE WRITE SUMMARY AND ANSWER ALL 4 QUESTIONS:
1.What do you think were the real reasons why the VCF system failed?
2.What were points of alignment and misalignment between the information system strategy and the FBI organization?
3.What do you think of the CIOs finalk comment about how to change attitudes? Do you think it will work? Why or Why not?
4.If you were the CIO, what would you do to help the FBI modernize and make better use of this information technology?
Explanation / Answer
Summary:
The Federal Bureau of Investigation of the U.S. government, the FBI, with its one of the resposibilities to fight crime and terrorism was forced to replace the Virtual Case File (VCF) management system due to the numerous delays, cost overruns, and incompatible software the system used. However, upon in-depth investigation the actual causes of system failure was revealed which were due to control, culture, and incompatible organizational systems.
The FBI requires a large number of agents in the Unites States and around the world who were required to share information among themselves within the bureau, and with other federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies. However, information sharing was not a standard operating procedure for this agency and the agents used to hold them physically with themselves and contempted its disclosure.
This turned out to be a confusion and crisis leading the FBI and Secret Service agents investigate as criminals in different cases. The British colleagues aware of both the agencies' secrets warded off the crisis suggesting the FBI to modernize their infrastructure, codenamed “Trilogy.” The project's goal was to provide the agents desktop PCs, high-bandwidth networks to connect FBI locations around the world and make the case information available worldwide. It would also provide facility for the agents collaborate among themselves and the agencies globally to send case information online web-based proces over the Internet (probably with a secured connection) to effectively and speedily provide productivity on the leads.
However they further claimed it did not work as the technology and others in other organizations and also within the FBI were very distrustful. The FBI's intention on how they want and work to share information and still keep them secret.
The high official of FBI explained on the FBI needing a culture change equipped with high-tech analysis and surveillance tools, a centralized integrated global intelligence operation enabling of sharing information preventing crimes in real-time.
The VCF system is shut down and the CIO is working on a new approach working with the agents in the field to build the next successful case management system. He is also working on a portfolio management plan to cover all of the FBI’s IT projects. His team is designing an enterprise architecture to set standards for a bureau-wide information system. They have reorganized the governance of IT, taking over IT budget control and giving total IT budget authority to the CIO.
The FBI is building a new case management system called 'Sentinel' in four phases. The first two phases have been deployed and, according to the Federal IT dashboard, the project is on schedule and on budget.
The new system will include workflow, document management, record management, audit trails, access control, and single sign-on. It will provide enhanced information sharing, search, and analysis capabilities to FBI agents and also facilitate information sharing with members of the law enforcement and intelligence communities. CIO would communicate with a gents and increase the training program for the new system to manage agents' expectations.
Their goal is to automate manually cumbersome things for the agents to enhance their productivity and their attitudes using the technology.
1.What do you think were the real reasons why the VCF system failed?
The real reasons why the VCF system failed was due to the numerous delays, cost overruns, and incompatible software the Virtual Case File (VCF) management system; control, culture, and incompatible organizational systems. Issue in the information sharing among agents in the field and with the agencies as it was not standard operating procedure. The agents holded the information with them physically close to their bulletproof vests avoiding to share information to others. Thus others unable to work on the case without the required infromation. There was also confusion and crisis between the FBI and Secret Service agents due to this failure. Another cause was because of decentralized system of case management and information sharing. As the technology and others in other organizations and also within the FBI were very distrustful this as well let to the failure.
2.What were points of alignment and misalignment between the information system strategy and the FBI organization?
Alignments:
FBI’s took efforts to modernize its infrastructure, codenamed “Trilogy.” The efforts included providing agents with 30,000 desktop PCs, high-bandwidth networks to connect FBI locations around the world, and the VCF project to facilitate sharing of case information worldwide.
The FBI Director explained that VCF would provide - an electronic means for agents to globally send field notes, documents, pieces of intelligence and other evidence so they could act faster on leads. It was designed to replace a paper-intensive process with an electronic, Web-based process.
The FBI intended to change its culture. They would get the high-tech analysis and surveillance tools it needs. They moved from a decentralized system to a centralized system for 56 the field offices with seamless integration global intelligence operation capable of sharing information and preventing crimes in real-time.
The FBI worked with the agents in the field to build the next successful case management system. They are working to build portfolio management plan that covers all of the FBI’s IT projects, even those begun in decentralized offices. His team has been designing an enterprise architecture that will lay out standards for a bureau-wide information system. The Director of the FBI has helped too. He reorganized the governance of IT, taking IT budget control away from the districts and giving total IT budget authority to the CIO.
The FBI is building a new case management system called Sentinel in four phases. The first two phases have been deployed and, according to the Federal IT dashboard, the project is on schedule and on budget.
The new system, according to the CIO, will include workflow, document management, record management, audit trails, access control, and single sign-on. It will provide enhanced information sharing, search, and analysis capabilities to FBI agents and also facilitate information sharing with members of the law enforcement and intelligence communities. To manage the expectations of the agents, the CIO plans to communicate often and significantly increase the training program for the new system.
TYhey want to automate those things that are the most manually cumbersome for the agents so they can see that technology can actually enhance their productivity and change their attitude.
Misalignments:
The VCF system has been shut down. The real reasons why the VCF system failed was due to the numerous delays, cost overruns, and incompatible software the Virtual Case File (VCF) management system; control, culture, and incompatible organizational systems. Issue in the information sharing among agents in the field and with the agencies as it was not standard operating procedure. The agents holded the information with them physically close to their bulletproof vests avoiding to share information to others. Thus others unable to work on the case without the required information. There was also confusion and crisis between the FBI and Secret Service agents due to this reason. Another cause was because of decentralized system of case management and information sharing. As the technology and others in other organizations and also within the FBI were very distrustful this as well led to the failure.
3.What do you think of the CIOs final comment about how to change attitudes?
Yes, the changes will bring the most positive effects, it woukd be effifient and fast for teh agents to provide productivity.
Do you think it will work?
Yes, It will work.
Why or Why not?
Because it is a centralized system they have setup now.
4.If you were the CIO, what would you do to help the FBI modernize and make better use of this information technology?
I would completely centralize the case management system providing as much of IT resources as possible for the agents in the field to use them effectively, efficiently and provide enahanced productivity. I would build an online web-based very secured online high bandwidth Intenet connection with sophistaced mobile and other devices for the agents to collaborate and share information to work on cases. I would opt for a Cloud Service Provider i.e., Amazon Web Services (AWS) for the compelete and very less fees IT infrastructure to be hosted and deployed for this purpose.
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