DCSA Official Warns U.S. Research Is Reaching China’s Military; Agency Plans Cloud Migration for DISS

Academic and technology research tied to the Defense Department and its allies is ending up in China’s government and military industrial complex, according to DOD News. Matthew Redding, assistant director of industrial security at the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency (DCSA), said in remarks Wednesday in Washington that China gains access through cyber espionage, placements of students at U.S. universities working on sensitive projects, and insider threats within the defense workforce. “The homeland is no longer secure,” Redding said, as quoted by DOD News.

Redding said DCSA continuously vets cleared Defense Department civilians, contractors, and roughly 10,000 companies doing business with the Pentagon, while training industry and flagging looming threats. He added that the FBI opens an espionage case on average every 12 hours, and that the agency receives about 30,000 suspicious contacts annually—winnowed to 4,000–5,000 credible reports feeding an annual threat assessment that highlights at-risk technologies, companies, and individuals, as reported by DOD News.

DCSA says it is working with universities to wall off sensitive research for vetted U.S. students and coordinating with the FBI on enforcement actions; further guidance from the Washington event and any law-enforcement updates are expected to follow.

In a separate agency notice published Wednesday, DCSA said the Defense Information System for Security (DISS) will migrate to the cloud this weekend as part of its Trusted Workforce 2.0 modernization, aiming to enhance security and streamline clearance verification processes (DCSA). The agency said DISS users will experience a temporary outage during the move, system navigation will remain the same after restoration, and the shift supports DOD’s Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability.

What’s next: Officials said additional guidance on threat mitigation and the DISS migration timeline will follow; users should monitor the system’s “About” tab for outage and restoration notices.