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War on Drugs: Information Management Poses Formidable Challenges

NCJ Number
134051
Date Published
1991
Length
33 pages
Annotation
This report presents information on the current status of the Federal drug control agencies' efforts to improve counterdrug information management and identifies relevant issues.
Abstract
At the present time, there are 24 civilian and intelligence agencies and 9 Department of Defense components operating over 100 drug control information systems. The Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) collects data to assess the information needs and capabilities of the drug control agencies in order to formulate a master plan for the use and sharing of the drug-related information and to oversee specific short-term communications improvements at the agencies. Five issues, in particular, affect effective and efficient information resources management (IRM): lack of central information resources leadership; lack of interoperability between systems used by the different agencies; data integrity problems; computer systems security; and proliferation of intelligence information. ONDCP plans to address interoperability, data integrity security, and aspects of proliferating sources of intelligence information as part of its overall master plan. Because it is unclear how ONDCP plans to address the need for central IRM leadership, recommendations are given regarding measurable objectives and specific time frames for resolving each of the five issues in development of the master plan.