HSI’s Guiding Principles of Data-Driven Support and Innovation and its goal to Optimize Operational Support Functions to Enable Mission Success, are the drivers for this procurement. Technological innovation increases efficiency, decreases operational costs, enhances security, and actively promotes information sharing. Investigative techniques and equipment must be updated and effective in uncovering criminal activity to ensure investigative and intelligence resources operate most efficiently and have the greatest impact possible.
Agents, analysts and support personnel perform three lines of effort that require contract support for data and analytical services: Screening and Vetting, Lead Development, and Criminal Analysis.
Screening and Vetting involves researching the names of individuals and entities in law enforcement and other databases to determine if they are threats to homeland security.
Lead Development involves researching and analyzing individuals, entities and suspicious activities to develop and disseminate information (such as alerts, investigative leads and investigative referrals) about possible criminals and criminal activity. The process of developing and disseminating alerts is also known as targeting or tipping and cueing.
Criminal Analysis is the comprehensive study of criminals and their networks, activities, associations, and impacts.
Every investigative and intelligence group, section, division and program routinely conducts at least one of these lines of effort and therefore would benefit from contract support that specializes in supporting these lines of effort
The need to uncover patterns in data using analytical methods and techniques enables the detection of criminal activities, criminal conspiracies, and criminal networks. Detection increases cooperation in investigations and leads to greater overall support for public safety, increases response rates, and gets results to decision makers much faster. The need to quickly analyze massive amounts of data along with current and developing conditions helps uncover fraud, risk, criminal activity, illicit finance, and terrorism patterns. By using data analysis methodology, law enforcement can analyze, model, and score massive amounts of data which makes it less challenging to capture and act upon critical information that will not only accelerate the criminal investigation process but also help to deploy agents and identify situations likely to escalate crime, fraud, risk, and terrorism acts/incidents, where needed.
The use of data (including access to unique proprietary datasets) combined with analytical services is needed to build on existing efforts to use data analytics to employ techniques like criminal network analysis to identify potential crime and fraud indicators, capture detailed data that would allow the detection of patterns and anomalies that could indicate criminal conspiracy and fraud, and mitigate fraud risks in compliance processes.
Agents and analysts routinely draw upon various government databases to gather and analyze leads regarding violation of immigration status, identify potential security or criminal threats, and ensure full compliance with immigration laws. Data obtained for ICE programs are managed by the DHS Library Program Management Division as part of a DHS efficiency initiative. Although this is a massive collection of resources for homeland security partners, there is still a need for increased access to volumes of data content and information, with appropriate support from skilled researchers/analysts and data scientists to process this data and information.
