DHS/CWMD/PIA-002 Biological Detection for the 21st Century (BD21) Technology Demonstration (TD)

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction (CWMD) Systems Support Directorate has been tasked and funded to evaluate networked biological detection and presumptive identification equipment for the purposes of informing the next generation detection of airborne bio-threats, as well as to recapitalize the BioWatch Program. To fulfill these responsibilities, CWMD is developing the Biological Detection for the 21st Century (BD21) Program. CWMD will install biological detection equipment at certain locations/sites as sensor nodes in various configurations. Each node is comprised of biological sensors, Global Positioning System (GPS) technology, a communications unit, meteorological sensors, and cameras, which are monitored and operated remotely (where possible). The sensor nodes capture environmental data and camera video/images which are transmitted to CWMD’s secure Amazon Web Services (AWS) Cloud for the purpose of developing algorithms and evaluating performance of the technologies. CWMD is conducting this PIA to evaluate the privacy risk associated with the use of this technology. July 2021

Associated SORN(s)