"If you've been at all worried that the Department of Homeland Security might be doing something worth paying attention to, rest easy. When it comes to having any significant impact on corporate IT security plans, the $36 billion federal agency has been monumentally ineffective,"
says this editorial in Computerworld.
Most technology "homeland security"-type efforts are coming from the private sector -- which you might expect, considering private companies own about 85% of electric, water and similar infrastructure. "But at least part of the fantasy behind spending billions of our tax dollars on the DHS was to create an agency that could orchestrate a public/private collaboration on security matters."
However, DHS apparently has no incentives at all for companies that oversee private infrastructure to actually do anything. But companies that sell technology certainly care. "Their agendas boil down to this: Prevent any new government regulations or reporting requirements that would mandate changes in IT products. So far, mission accomplished."