OREANDA-NEWS. General Dynamics Information Technology, a business unit of General Dynamics (NYSE: GD), is one of 17 companies selected to provide cyber security services to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and other government agencies, including state and local entities as well as the defense industrial base sector, through a blanket purchase agreement issued by the General Services Administration (GSA). The five-year Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation agreement has a potential value of USD 6 billion to all awardees if all options are exercised.

General Dynamics will provide DHS, federal, state, local and tribal governments with continuous monitoring tools, diagnosis and mitigation activities to strengthen the security of .gov networks, assess and combat cyber risks in real-time and support the launch of DHS’ Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation (CDM) program. Under this program, DHS will centrally oversee the procurement of solutions to quickly identify and prioritize security issues, as well as empower technical managers to prioritize and mitigate risks.

Using the Continuous Monitoring as a Service (CMaaS) approach, any eligible agency can retain General Dynamics for turn-key network monitoring and security-risk mitigation services. General Dynamics will assist agencies that require additional support by providing CMaaS to support data integration and agency customization services.

“General Dynamics has a long history providing cyber security services to the Department of Homeland Security and other federal agencies,” said Zannie Smith, senior vice president and general manager of General Dynamics Information Technology’s National and Homeland Security division. “We look forward to leveraging our many years of DHS program management experience and in-depth understanding of DHS’ goals and objectives to help agencies improve their network security.”

General Dynamics will support DHS in building maturity into the continuous diagnostics and mitigation program across the federal enterprise, developing a federal network infrastructure that is solidly based on secure engineering principles, and transferring risk to where it appropriately belongs to establish and maintain accountability.