Materiel Solutions for Data Fusion (DF)

Request for Information (RFI) for Electronic System Center's (ESCs) Materiel Solutions for Data Fusion (DF) Development Planning (DP) Efforts PURPOSE: This is a Request for Information (RFI), as defined in Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 15.201(e). The Government is issuing this RFI in an effort to understand market availability, technical characteristics, and functionality of Information Technology (IT) tools, applications or products capable of satisfying the technical, functional, and/or operational capabilities described in this RFI. This is not a request for proposal, request for quotation, or invitation for bid, nor does its issuance obligate or restrict the Government to an eventual acquisition approach. The Government does not intend to award a contract on the basis of responses from this RFI or pay for the preparation of any information submitted or use of such information. All information received from this RFI will be used for planning and market research purposes only. All information received in response to the RFI that is marked Proprietary will be handled accordingly. The Government shall not be liable for or suffer any consequential damages for any proprietary information not properly identified. Proprietary information will be safeguarded in accordance with the applicable Government regulations. BACKGROUND: The purpose of this RFI is to gather information on materiel solutions incorporating cost-saving approaches and best practices for implementing Data Fusion (DF) capabilities in the 624 Operations Center (OC). Information received as a result of responses to this RFI will be used in Electronic System Center's (ESC's) formulation of one or more Concept Characterization Technical Description (CCTD) documents. These documents are being produced as part of the Development Planning (DP) efforts (including Cross-Domain Solution (CDS) and User Defined Operating Picture (UDOP)) requested by Air Force Space Command (AFSPC) to address 624 OC's requirements. ESC/XR has been tasked with leading this DP effort and provides the following high-level descriptions of DF capability: ? This DP effort is in response to an Air Force Materiel Command (AFMC) Commander request to provide assistance in the development and support of a DF capability. DF solutions will need to individually consider discrete variables for correlation, aggregation, or other forms of analysis that will reduce the cognitive burden on the operators and facilitate effective Course of Action (COA) development and decision making. ? Analyzed data will be used to enhance the operational picture of cyber resources, improving situational awareness. ASSUMPTIONS ? All sources of data will be available in an unclassified or classified (SECRET) domain. Systems to migrate unclassified data to the classified domain are being researched separately. Solutions for cross-domain capabilities are not required in the responses to this RFI. ? A wide variety of low-latency cyber infrastructure inventory, configuration, maintenance status, and performance data is available for collection, aggregation, and analysis. ? A wide variety of security vulnerability data is available and significant alert/warning indicators have been established to generate low-latency threat data for collection, aggregation, and analysis. ? Cyber infrastructure requirements and baseline system performance profiles for military operations is available as another network accessible data source for collection, aggregation, and analysis. ? The material solutions must use Open Technology Development (OTD) practices with open interfaces, open standards, and open software. It is preferred that solutions be compatible with a service-oriented architecture (SOA) compliant integration framework. ? The products should provide a standards-based and common integration infrastructure to accept, store, aggregate, and display data that is flexible and modifiable to maximize operational situational awareness for Cyber Command and Control (C2). REQUESTED INFORMATION Describe product solutions which address the following areas for DF capabilities: ? Long-term aggregation, correlation, and analysis of historical anomalous system activities within the Air Force (AF) cyber infrastructure to identify new information security threats and maintenance trends. ? Assessment of planned business processes (military operations) against expected AF cyber infrastructure performance to identify and categorize operational risks. Factors should include known resource requirements, maintenance issues, and information security vulnerabilities. ? Assessment of active business processes (military operations) against current AF cyber infrastructure performance, maintenance activity, and information security events to identify operational impacts and assist in the determination of root cause. Proposed solution capabilities should include but are not limited to: ? Methods for aggregating, correlating, and fusing data collected from diverse sources including but not limited to direct computer and network hardware interfaces, software application and database queries, web sites, streaming multicast data, text files, and human inputs. ? Support dynamic shifts from a general monitoring posture to a more detailed event-focused collection, aggregation, and analysis posture as significant events occur. ? High fidelity of control for establishing significant event criteria and event handling rules. ? The ability to review the flow and transformation of an event's source data through each stage of data fusion processes. ? Role or Attribute-based access control features. Additional data required should include but is not limited to: ? List any Department of Defense/National Security Agency security certifications obtained or currently under review for products in the proposed solution. ? Describe data preprocessing capabilities( e.g. calibration, formatting, normalization, etc.) ? Describe any inherent incident response / workflow management capability or integration with 3rd party equivalents. ? Describe user training and/or contracted support requirements to establish and maintain solution configurations in response to rapidly changing military operations. ? Describe any warranty, long-term maintenance, or software licensing programs associated with the proposed solution. ? Describe any near-term functional improvements planned for products in the proposed solution, and/or a general roadmap of projected improvements over the next 5 years. ? Discuss any current or previous experiences within the last 5 years in supporting similar efforts for government departments/agencies and other business sectors (finance, logistics, healthcare, law enforcement, marketing, etc.). ? Describe any proven experience delivering complicated systems engineering and technical development services within the Federal Government, with emphasis in the telecommunications and network security environments, successful implementation of UDOPs, and use of collaborative technologies in delivered capabilities. RESPONSES: Product capability responses to this RFI are requested to be submitted by e-mail to Cassandra.Carlson.ctr@hanscom.af.mil and Tim.Greene@hanscom.af.mil not later than 1500 hours EST on 24 February 2012. Responses should be single-spaced, Times New Roman, 12 point font, with one inch margins all around, compatible with MS Office Word 2007, with a total page count not to exceed fifteen (15) pages of text with no more than twenty (20) pages of attachments. The response should not exceed a 5 MB mail limit. Responses to this RFI will be reviewed by military personnel, government civilians, DoD contractors and MITRE System Engineers; all covered by non-disclosure agreements. MITRE Corporation is a Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC) and, as such, fulfills an unbiased, non-profit role for the Air Force. The responses may be forwarded to other Government entities in consideration for applicability to other programs. Be advised that all submissions become Government property and will not be returned. All government, DoD contractor and MITRE personal reviewing RFI responses will have signed non-disclosure agreements and understand their responsibility for proper use and protection from unauthorized disclosure of proprietary information as described 41 USC 423.