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By: FEDweek StaffAn inspector general report has said that while the IRS has taken steps to address physical risks to its facilities in response to an earlier audit, it still does not “ensure that minimum physical security countermeasures were tracked and considered.
That process “does not consistently use a centralized system to track physical security countermeasure recommendations, approvals, implementation actions,” said the auditors, who said they were unable to determine the status of all the current recommended physical security countermeasures at some of the agency’s more than 500 locations.
Issues included that the tracking system was “not intuitive” and that physical security specialists lacked training in how to use it, said the report which comes at a time of elevated concern about threats to federal employees in general and to IRS employees in particular.
It added that the IRS has a process for determining and identifying “physical security risk acceptance”—options when the desired level of protection is not achievable, a suggested countermeasure is not used, or a lower-level countermeasure is selected. However, the specialists “did not consistently and clearly document when a request for risk acceptance was made or have a defined process to reject a recommended countermeasure.”
“Without a process that requires physical security specialists to document their rationale and obtain approval for rejecting a recommended countermeasure, physical security specialists may choose not to implement a countermeasure that is required per Interagency Security Committee standards, thereby increasing risk to IRS personnel and facilities,” it said.
It said that IRS management plans to put in place a central tool to track and maintain countermeasures to provide training.
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