Nov 11, 2011

Hope Lane

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DoD Hosts Public Meeting on Contractor Protection of Unclassified Information

The Department of Defense (“DoD”) will host a public meeting on November 15, 2011 to initiate a dialogue between industry and government regarding the Proposed Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement (“DFARs”) Rule establishing basic safeguarding requirements applicable to non-public DoD information residing on contractor and subcontractor non-classified information systems, and imposing heightened safeguarding requirements and incident reporting obligations for certain categories of information.

The meeting will be held from 9:30 am to 12:00 pm EST at the General Services Administration (“GSA”), Central Office Auditorium, 1800 F St. NW, Washington, DC 20405. The meeting notice also further extends the deadline for submitting comments on the proposed rule to December 16, 2011. 

The Proposed Rule imposes substantial compliance obligations for protection of unclassified information. Contractors and Subcontractors who currently have or may potentially have unclassified DoD information resident on or transiting through their unclassified information systems should consider attending the upcoming meeting and participating in the crucial discussion regarding the intended scope, likely interpretation, and impact of the proposed rule. 

The Proposed Rule establishes two levels of safeguards (Basic and Enhanced) for protection of nonpublic DoD information (1) that has not been cleared for public release and (2) provided by or on behalf of DoD or collected, developed, received, or transmitted in conjunction with the contractor’s support of an official DoD activity. The safeguard requirements must also be flowed down to subcontractors.

Information from McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP