Homeland Security Acquisitions: Opportunities Exist to Further Improve DHS's Oversight of Test and Evaluation Activities
Fast Facts
The Department of Homeland Security invests billions of dollars each year in new technologies such as facial recognition software, X-ray equipment, surveillance aircraft, and U.S. Coast Guard ships.
We looked at how DHS tests and evaluates technologies to ensure they work before deploying them. The agency has strengthened its policies, guidance, and training to encourage testing and evaluation earlier in the acquisition process.
We recommended that DHS assess whether it has enough workers with the right skills to adequately oversee test and evaluation activities.
DHS tests and evaluates new technologies like facial recognition software to verify the identities of travelers leaving the country.
Woman looking into a facial recognition screen at an airport
Highlights
What GAO Found
Since August 2010, the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Office of Test and Evaluation (OTE) has assessed major acquisition programs’ test results and DHS leadership has used OTE’s assessments to make informed acquisition decisions. Programs generally received approval to progress through the acquisition life cycle, but DHS placed conditions on its approvals in more than half the cases GAO reviewed.
Since May 2017, OTE has updated its policies and released new guidance that met nearly all of the key test and evaluation (T&E) practices GAO identified as contributing to successful acquisition outcomes. For example, OTE’s policy directs program managers to designate a T&E manager who is required to be certified to the highest level in the T&E career field—level III. This met the key practice that programs establish an appropriately trained test team. However, OTE’s guidance partially met the key practice to demonstrate that subsystems work together prior to finalizing a system’s design. Specifically, the guidance instructs programs to conduct integration testing, but not until after the design is finalized. GAO’s past work has shown that changes after finalizing design can increase costs or delay schedules.
DHS faces challenges with its T&E workforce to effectively provide oversight. As shown in the figure, GAO determined that most programs do not have a level III certified T&E manager.
Status of Certified Test and Evaluation (T&E) Manager Designations Reported by DHS Major Acquisition Programs GAO Reviewed, as of March 2019
OTE also compiles data to monitor programs and the status of T&E managers, but GAO found that OTE’s data were unreliable. Specifically, OTE had inaccurate data for about half of the programs reviewed. Establishing a process for collecting and maintaining reliable data can improve OTE’s ability to accurately track programs’ T&E managers. Further, DHS has expanded OTE’s responsibilities for T&E oversight in recent years. However, OTE officials said executing these responsibilities has been difficult because DHS has not authorized changes to its federal workforce since 2014. These officials added that they have had to prioritize their oversight efforts to programs actively engaged in testing and, as such, are unable to assist programs that are early in the acquisition life cycle. By assessing OTE’s workforce, DHS can take steps to ascertain the extent to which OTE has the number of staff with the necessary skills to fulfill the full scope of its oversight responsibilities.
Why GAO Did This Study
DHS invests several billion dollars in major acquisition programs each year to support its many missions. Conducting T&E of program capabilities is a critical aspect of DHS’s acquisition process to ensure systems work as intended before being delivered to end users, such as Border Patrol agents.
GAO was asked to review DHS’s T&E activities for major acquisition programs. This report examines, among other objectives, the extent to which DHS has (1) assessed programs’ test results and used this information to make acquisition decisions; (2) policies and guidance that reflect key T&E practices; and (3) a workforce to effectively oversee programs’ T&E activities.
GAO reviewed OTE’s assessments of program test results and acquisition decision memorandums. GAO assessed DHS’s policies and guidance against key T&E practices developed by GAO for the purpose of this report. GAO also reviewed data on the T&E workforce that provides oversight at the program and headquarters levels, as well as met with OTE and other relevant DHS officials.
Recommendations
GAO is making five recommendations, including that DHS revise its guidance to fully meet GAO’s key T&E practice to demonstrate that subsystems work together prior to finalizing a system’s design; establish a process for collecting and maintaining reliable data on programs’ T&E managers; and assess OTE’s workforce. DHS concurred with GAO’s recommendations.
Recommendations for Executive Action
Agency Affected | Recommendation | Status |
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Department of Homeland Security | The Secretary for Homeland Security should direct the Director of OTE to revise T&E policy or guidance as necessary to fully meet the key practice for programs to test that components and subsystems work together as a system in a controlled setting before finalizing a system's design. (Recommendation 1) |
DHS concurred with our recommendation and, in October 2020, revised its T&E policy to specify that programs should complete integration testing to demonstrate that components and subsystems work together before finalizing a system design.
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Department of Homeland Security | The Secretary for Homeland Security should direct the Director of OTE, in coordination with OCPO, to develop an assessment process-including establishing performance measures-to help ensure T&E training achieves desired results. (Recommendation 2) |
DHS concurred with our recommendation. In November 2022, DHS's Test and Evaluation Division developed a survey process to obtain feedback from key T&E personnel assigned to major acquisition programs to assess how well the training addressed learning objectives and prepared them to fulfill their T&E responsibilities. We reviewed TED's surveys and determined they established performance measures and meet the intent of this recommendation to help ensure that DHS's T&E training addresses training objectives and achieves desired results.
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Department of Homeland Security | The Secretary for Homeland Security should direct the Director of OTE to revise T&E policy or guidance as necessary to specify when in the acquisition life cycle a major acquisition program manager should designate a level III certified T&E manager. (Recommendation 3) |
DHS concurred with our recommendation and, in October 2020, revised its T&E policy to specify that programs should designate a certified test and evaluation manager by acquisition decision event 2A.
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Department of Homeland Security | The Secretary for Homeland Security should direct the Director of OTE to establish an internal control process to ensure that data collected and maintained on major acquisition programs' T&E managers are reliable. (Recommendation 4) |
DHS concurred with our recommendation and in June 2021 DHS' Test and Evaluation Division revised its Internal Process Handbook to document the process for maintaining and updating T&E manager data and reviewed the accuracy of current data through the T&E working group.
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Department of Homeland Security | The Secretary for Homeland Security should direct the Under Secretary for Science and Technology to assess OTE's workforce to ascertain the extent to which it has the appropriate number of staff with the necessary skills to fulfill its responsibilities. (Recommendation 5) |
DHS concurred with our recommendation. In May 2020, the Science and Technology Directorate conducted a workforce analysis for the Office of System Engineering, which includes the Test and Evaluation Division (TED), and identified TED's approved staffing strategy in June 2021.
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