Vendors Descend on Los Alamos

Closure of the Los Alamos National Laboratory Friday, following a major security breach, has storage networking vendors on the horn selflessly offering their help in this time of national emergency.

The lab, which is managed by the University of California under contract with the U.S. Department of Energy, is still trying to find "removeable media" containing classified weapons secrets that went missing earlier this month (see Los Alamos Leak Scrutinized).

Separately, the Project on Government Oversight (POGO), a government watchdog group, issued an "unconfirmed investigative lead" on Sunday that claims personnel at Los Alamos sent classified information over the labs' unclassified and unprotected email network at least 17 times in recent months.

At least one industry source says storage vendors have taken all this as an opportunity to knock on Los Alamos's door with proposed solutions for tighter security. "All the big storage companies and their partners are approaching the lab," says the source, who asked not to be identified. "Being the vendor who guards the country's nuclear secrets would be something desirable."

A small but growing roster of firms specializes in SAN security, including Decru Inc., NeoScale Systems Inc., and Vormetric Inc.Until now, sales of SAN security products from these outfits haven't set the storage world on fire, so to speak. But the inflammatory Los Alamos headlines may bolster business a bit. The lab hasn't issued any formal RFP for better security gear, but sources say government brass are insisting on technological changes.

A press release issued last Thursday by the Department of Energy, for instance, states that Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham has ordered his chief information officer to look into having engineers and scientists use diskless workstations instead of "classified removeable electronic media" (CREM) to port work around.

It's questionable, though, whether the problem at Los Alamos and other Department of Energy labs can be solved by technology alone. According to POGO, a July 13 hearing of the Committee on Energy and Commerce focused on "cultural" issues at Los Alamos.

POGO's transcript of the hearing indicates that Linton Brooks, Administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration, thinks Los Alamos, along with a other labs like Sandia National Laboratories, where a floppy went missing but was found earlier this week, foster a disregard for good management because of their emphasis on science above all.

It's a complaint that echoes that of Los Alamos lab director Pete Nanos, who called a halt Friday to lab operations pending location of the missing disks. In a memo to all of the lab's roughly 11,000 employees, Nanos suggested that a "willful flouting of the rules" of security at Los Alamos is at the heart of the problem, and he has ordered a face-to-face review of all personnel before work resumes in any of the lab's divisions."People who believe their dedication to science or to our mission supercedes our commitments to safety, security and environmental compliance put us all at risk," the memo states.

Nanos has slated another "all hands" meeting of lab personnel Thursday morning. Meanwhile, at Abraham's orders, Brooks and Deputy Secretary of Energy Kyle McSlarrow visited Los Alamos yesterday. News reports noted they were joined by representatives of the House's Committee on Energy and Commerce, including Chairman Joe L. Barton, Republican from Texas, and Diana DeGette, a Democrat from Colorado. Barton in particular has been vocal in taking Los Alamos to task for its security problems.

It's a scenario tailor-made for storage networking vendors with security products to peddle. And given that Los Alamos is a SAN adopter, unafraid to invest in gear from startups like Panasas Inc. (see Panasas), it's likely they'll get a receptive ear. Whether that turns into a big contract, however, remains to be seen.

Mary Jander, Site Editor, Byte and Switch