New U.S. DoJ Rule Halts Bulk Data Transfers to Adversarial Nations to Protect Privacy

On the same subject

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  May 15, 2024 | International, Security

  US Congress passes broad aviation bill on safety and consumer rights

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  March 25, 2020 | International, C4ISR

  Amazon Denounces DoD JEDI ‘Do-Over’

  The Pentagon's request to reconsider narrow technical aspects of the award to Microsoft, Amazon argues, ignores a wide range of fundamental flaws. By SYDNEY J. FREEDBERG JR. WASHINGTON: Amazon Web Services has publicly denounced the Defense Department's latest legal maneuver in the months-long public battle over the JEDI cloud computing contract, awarded to Microsoft last year. No, Amazon said in a statement this morning, the Pentagon should not get to redo a particular piece of the award process the judge found flawed, because that was just one flaw among many and fixing it is a distraction from the larger issues. “We're pleased to see the DoD recognize the need to take corrective action,” the Amazon statement began, “but we're concerned that the proposed approach is not designed to provide a complete, fair, and effective re-evaluation.” “Both earlier in the adjudication process when we submitted 265 questions to the DoD that they refused to answer, and in our protest where we outlined numerous significant flaws in the evaluation, it's been clear that there were many problems with the DoD's initial decision,” the statement continues. “Instead of addressing the breadth of problems in its proposed corrective action, the DoD's proposal focuses only on providing Microsoft a ‘do-over' on its fatally flawed bid while preventing AWS from adjusting its own pricing in response to the DoD's new storage criteria.” “This attempt to gerrymander the corrective action without fixing all of the serious flaws pointed out in our complaint raises significant questions,” the statement concludes. The Pentagon's plan to consolidate many — but not all — of its 500-plus cloud contracts into a single Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI). Note the suggestion that the single “pathfinder” contract for JEDI might evolve into multiple JEDI contracts. An email circulated by Amazon went further: “DoD's proposed corrective action seeks to resurrect Microsoft's award eligibility and directly and unreasonably benefits Microsoft's deficient approach. DoD's proposed corrective action does not meaningfully address the numerous errors identified in AWS's protest. These errors were pervasive, impacting all six of the technical evaluation factors” — that is, not just the one the Pentagon is asking to redo. “From the President's order to ‘screw' Amazon out of the contract, to the Secretary halting the award for an 85-day ‘examination,' to the Secretary's bizarre recusal after an award decision had been made, to the numerous inexplicable evaluation errors, to the refusal to substantively address AWS's 265 post-award debriefing questions, to the blatant political interference which impacted the award decision – the history of this procurement casts serious doubt on the rationality and fairness of DoD's proposed correction action,” the email said bluntly. Some backstory might help in parsing all this. (Click here for more detail). On Feb. 13, the court had granted Amazon a preliminary injunction, saying the company would “likely” be able to prove the Department of Defense had erred in one particular portion of its process – an evaluation of the two companies called Price Scenario 6 – when it awarded the potentially $10 billion contract to Microsoft Azure. On March 12th, DoD responded by asking the judge to “remand” the case back to DoD so it could correct and redo Price Scenario 6, giving Microsoft and Amazon the opportunity to submit updated bids – albeit with very strict limits on those updates. “During the proposed remand,” DoD's motion said, “the agency potentially could make decisions that would moot this action, in whole or in part, and may obviate the need for further litigation in this Court.” In other words, the Pentagon is asking the judge: let us fix this one thing, and then there might be nothing left for Amazon to object to, and you can dismiss the case. Today, Amazon replied: We have plenty more to object to – and we think the judge will side with us. https://breakingdefense.com/2020/03/amazon-denounces-dod-jedi-do-over

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  April 20, 2020 | International, Aerospace

  Spirit AeroSystems bringing back some furloughed workers

  WICHITA, Kan. — A major aircraft parts supplier in Kansas is expected to bring about 2,100 furloughed workers back to work next week as Boeing prepares to resume production of its commercial airplanes. Spirit AeroSystems also is planning resume work for more than 1,700 other workers in Wichita over the next three weeks, The Wichita Eagle reported. “As our customer, Boeing, begins to resume production, Spirit AeroSystems will work with our employees, customers and suppliers to begin a phased-in return to work for some furloughed employees," Spirit spokeswoman Keturah Austin said. She added that “this will be a slow process as we work to continue to support our customer's operations in a manner that is safe for all involved.” Boeing said Thursday it will restart production of its commercial airplanes next week in the Seattle area, putting about 27,000 people back to work at its facilities in the Seattle area after operations were suspended because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Boeing employees for the 737, 747, 767 and 777 airplanes will return as early as Monday with most returning to work by Tuesday, Boeing is Spirit AeroSystem's biggest customer, and the impact has rippled to its suppliers. About 2,100 workers, hourly and salaried, are scheduled to return to various production lines at the Spirit plant in Wichita on Monday, according to a union officials and numbers obtained by the newspaper. They'll be joined by another 200 workers on April 27; an additional 1,100 on April 29; and nearly 400 on May 4. Cornell Beard, president of Machinists District Lodge 70, said the returning union workers are still a fraction of the plant's full workforce, “but anything's better than nothing.” The coronavirus has exacerbated Boeing's crisis surrounding the 737 Max, which remains grounded after two deadly crashes. Boeing said Thursday its 737 program “”will resume working toward restarting production"" of the 737 MAX. Spirit produces about 70 percent of the 737 Max, including the fuselage. Contracts with Boeing for the Max represents more than half of Spirit's annual income. Future callbacks at Spirit will be largely dependent on Boeing's performance in getting the 737 Max back in the air, Beard said. “If another mistake is found, or another defect, or if we just encounter another problem, those projections will change again (and) we're going to be right back in this pickle,” Beard said. https://www.defensenews.com/industry/2020/04/17/spirit-aerosystems-bringing-back-some-furloughed-workers