The Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, which directed the establishment of the Information Sharing Environment (ISE), also requires the President to designate a Program Manager with government-wide authority to manage the ISE, oversee its implementation, assist in the development of ISE standards and practices, and monitor and assess its implementation by federal agencies.

On May 27, 2010, President Obama appointed Mr. Kshemendra Paul as the Program Manager for the Information Sharing Environment.

PM-ISE Activities

The Program Manager is supported by a multidisciplinary team to address a wide range of ISE priorities:

• Connectivity between Federal and State, Local, and Tribal Partners - Continue efforts to ensure state and major urban area fusion centers have access to integrated classified and unclassified federal information and are operating at a baseline level capability to better support national efforts to identify emerging crime, including crime associated with terrorism.
• Suspicious Activity Reporting Framework - Institutionalize a nationwide capacity to gather and share Suspicious Activity Reports in a manner that protects privacy and civil liberties.
• Privacy and Civil Liberties - Implement privacy and civil liberties policies across the Federal Government and encourage States to implement equivalent privacy policies and procedures.
• Over-classification - Eliminate the outdated “need to know” concept and minimize originator controls to enhance information sharing.
• Security Clearance Restructuring - Adopt common standards and processes for security clearances that extend across all levels of government, to include our SLT and private sector partners.
• Reciprocity for Systems and Facilities - Align federal security policy (facilities, personnel, and systems) to ensure they are reciprocal in all federal agencies and with state, local, tribal and private sector partners.
• Coordinated Funding for Information Sharing Initiatives - Track agency budgets to reduce overlaps and gaps in funding of information sharing programs, and monitor investments to drive agencies to adopt compatible technologies and business processes to maximize use of scarce resources.