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Volume 21 — Issue 47 | December 2, 2021

Protecting America’s First Responders Act of 2021 signed into law

On November 18, the President signed into law the Protecting America’s First Responders Act of 2021 (PAFRA). PAFRA ensures that law enforcement and first responders who are disabled in the line of duty have prompt access to benefits.

PAFRA more broadly defines what it means to be disabled. Previously, first responders were only eligible for disability benefits if they were unable to perform any of their compensated work. Now, disabled first responders who can still perform work that involves simple tasks, perform work for therapeutic purposes or receive special accommodations to be able to work would still be eligible for benefits.

In 2006, the Department of Justice (DOJ) implemented regulations that established a narrow definition of “firefighter” that resulted in some fire police officers losing eligibility for disability benefits. Although some fire police were still able to qualify for benefits as firefighters or police officers, there were cases where a fire police officer suffered a fatal injury while responding to an incident as a member of a fire department and the application was denied.

PAFRA will remedy this problem, since PAFRA also expands the Public Safety Officer’s Benefit (PSOB) program to public safety officers that are not currently covered, including officers who act outside of their jurisdiction in an emergency situation, trainee officers and fire police who handle traffic and scene management.

The Act also closes a loophole that prevents children of first responders who are born after the first responder's death from receiving education benefits and would require the DOJ to compensate children who ultimately paid for their own education due to delays in the claims process.

The legislation is intended to facilitate quicker processing of benefit claims and to speed up benefit payments. To address lengthy delays in processing claims, PAFRA indexes the award amount to the date of the final determination rather than the date of death or injury for cases that remain pending for more than 365 days. It also increases the interim death benefits amount from $3,000 to $6,000 and ties interim benefits to the consumer price index going forward. Additionally, the legislation allows the DOJ to issue subpoenas to third-party agencies to receive necessary documents earlier in the claims process in order to expedite the process.

(Sources: Congress.gov, FireRescue1)

Highlights

Protecting America’s First Responders Act of 2021 signed into law

NHTSA publishes new National EMS Education Standards

Evacuation planning for wildfires: webinar series from the Fire Adapted Communities Learning Network

Webinar: Blue Campaign anti-human trafficking training event

Cyber Threats

The U.S. Fire Administration operates the Emergency Management and Response – Information Sharing and Analysis Center (EMR-ISAC).

For information regarding the EMR-ISAC visit www.usfa.dhs.gov/emr-isac or contact the EMR-ISAC office at: (301) 447-1325 and/or fema-emr-isac@fema.dhs.gov.

NHTSA publishes new National EMS Education Standards

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) recently published a significant update to a foundational document within the emergency medical services (EMS) profession: the National EMS Education Standards (the Standards).

This major revision of the Standards is the first since its original publication in 2009, and it is the product of a community-wide, collaborative effort. The NHTSA and the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), Maternal and Child Health Bureau’s EMS for Children Program funded the effort through a process led by the National Association of EMS Educators (NAEMSE).

Emergency medical services are a critical component of the nation’s healthcare system. However, EMS is still a young profession. An integrated system approach to EMS education is essential to achieving the goal of developing EMS clinicians across the country who are competent in the appropriate knowledge, skills, and abilities for their licensure level. The National EMS Education Standards are a core element of this integrated system.

The Standards define the competencies, clinical behaviors, and judgments required of EMS personnel to perform their roles. This publication does not replace the need to develop a curriculum, nor is it intended to limit EMS educational programs from going beyond the Standards to meet student or community needs.

The Standards are part of an overall EMS education system that was first envisioned in the landmark 1996 EMS Agenda for the Future (the Agenda). The Agenda established, for the first time in EMS history, a national vision for EMS as “community-based health management that is fully integrated with the overall health care system.” The Agenda defined 14 attributes of EMS, one of which was a system to educate current and future generations of EMS practitioners.

The 2021 Standards build on the foundation created by the EMS Agenda for the Future and other landmark documents that followed. It incorporates the vision of EMS Agenda 2050, published in 2019, and the recently updated National EMS Scope of Practice Model (significantly revised in 2019, with minor revisions in March and August of this year). The 2021 Standards, EMS Agenda 2050, as well as current and historical versions of these guidance documents defining a national EMS system of education are available at NHTSA’s Office of EMS (OEMS) website.

(Source: NHTSA OEMS)

Evacuation planning for wildfires: webinar series from the Fire Adapted Communities Learning Network

The Fire Adapted Communities Learning Network (FAC Net) is dedicated to advancing community wildfire resilience. FAC Net recently hosted an information-packed, two-part webinar series on evacuation planning for wildland fires. The webinars were recorded and can be viewed on FAC Net’s YouTube channel.

Part 1 of the series shares best practices in evacuation planning from practitioners in Ashland, Oregon; Boulder, Colorado; and Deschutes County, Oregon. Highlights include:

• Ashland’s Evacuation Time Estimate Study. This study was conducted to address the City of Ashland’s vulnerability to fast-moving wildfires and limited ingress and egress routes due to its unique linear design resting within three mountain ranges.
• Boulder’s Severe Weather Plan. Boulder County shared lessons learned in planning alerts and warnings from past wildfires, input from California practitioners, and its 3-year engagement with the Boulder community to develop this plan prior to its implementation in 2020 during the CalWood and Lefthand Canyon fires. Boulder’s Office of Emergency Management disseminates alerts and warnings on its Emergency Status webpage.
• Deschutes County’s live map. Deschutes County shared lessons learned from the Labor Day fires of 2020, which displaced people from eight counties in western and southern Oregon. This resulted in a surge of evacuees from these eight counties into central Oregon - where Deschutes county is located - all in a single night. Deschutes County disseminates information via a live map which is synced to a statewide situational awareness tool - the Real-time Assessment and Planning Tool for Oregon (RAPTOR).

Part 2 of the series discusses findings and recommendations related to wildfire evacuation planning from three research studies:

• Evaluating Rural Pacific Northwest Towns for Wildfire Evacuation Vulnerability. This study developed a scoring system to help quantify the evacuation vulnerability of 696 rural towns in Washington and Oregon. The study analyzes fire hazards and the geospatial characteristics of road networks of these rural towns to score each town’s evacuation vulnerability. The web-based tool displaying the study’s results can be accessed here.
• Wildfire Preparedness and Evacuation Planning in a Pandemic: Case studies from California and Colorado. This study by a National Science Foundation-funded CONVERGE COVID-19 Working Group examined how communities in two locations at high risk from wildfires – Nevada County in California and Larimer County in Colorado –perceived and practiced safety as they prepared for wildfires and recovered from wildfires during the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Preparing for Wildfire Evacuation and Alternatives: Exploring Influences on Residents’ Intended Evacuation Behaviors and Mitigations. This study focused on some of the policy and social science dimensions of wildland fire. In every wildfire, there are some people who opt to stay and defend their property or to shelter in place in their home or a common area. This study explored different “evacuation intentions” and associated wildfire mitigation behaviors.

Visit FAC Net’s blog to learn more about the webinars, access additional planning resources, and see answers to the questions asked by participants during the webinars.

(Source: FAC Net)

Webinar: Blue Campaign anti-human trafficking training event

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s (CISA’s) Stakeholder Engagement Division (SED) conducts a monthly webinar series to develop partnerships, facilitate dialogue, convene stakeholders, and promotes awareness to help CISA achieve a secure and resilient infrastructure for the American people. 

This month’s webinar, scheduled for Thursday, Dec. 16, from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. EST, will feature the Department of Homeland Security’s Blue Campaign. CISA’s SED and Region 8 will host the webinar.

Every year, millions of men, women, and children are trafficked worldwide, including right here in the United States. It can happen in any community to victims of any age, race, gender, or nationality. Traffickers might use violence, manipulation, or false promises of well-paying jobs or romantic relationships to lure victims into trafficking situations.

Blue Campaign is a national public awareness campaign designed to educate the public, law enforcement and other industry partners to recognize the indicators of human trafficking, and how to appropriately respond to possible cases. During this webinar, the Blue Campaign team will discuss the Campaign’s tools and resources that are available to combat human trafficking within the United States. 

By the end of the webinar, participants will:

• Understand the scope and definition of human trafficking.
• Recognize indicators of risk.
• Know when and how to respond to suspected human trafficking.

This webinar is open to anyone interested, but registration is required. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar. Please send any questions, comments, and/or feedback to BlueCampaign@hq.dhs.gov.

(Sources: CISA, DHS)

Cyber Information and Incident Assistance Links

MS-ISAC
SOC@cisecurity.org
1-866-787-4722

IdentityTheft.gov

IC3

Cybercrime Support Network

General Information
Links

StopRansomware.gov

FTC scam list

CISA alerts

Law Enforcement Cyber Center

TLP Information

CISA releases Capacity Enhancement Guides to enhance mobile device cybersecurity for consumers and organizations

CISA has released actionable Capacity Enhancement Guides (CEGs) to help users and organizations improve mobile device cybersecurity.

• The CEG: Mobile Device Cybersecurity Checklist for Consumers provides steps for consumers, including using strong authentication and enabling automatic operating system updates.
• The CEG: Mobile Device Cybersecurity Checklist for Organizations provides steps to help organizations secure mobile access to enterprise resources.

CISA encourages users and administrators to review the guidance and apply the recommendations.

(Source: CISA)

Majority of US retailers, critical infrastructure unscathed after holiday cyber warnings

Critical infrastructure providers and most U.S. retailers got through the holiday weekend unscathed, as pre-Thanksgiving alerts from federal authorities put security operations teams on notice to prepare for threat activity and tighten password and authentication protocols.

Ransomware attacks against Colonial Pipeline, IT monitoring service Kaseya and meat distributor JBS USA all took place during long weekends or holidays, leading federal authorities and industry executives to fear a nation state or criminal threat actor would target vulnerable U.S. industries during holiday weekends.

(Source: Cybersecurity Dive)

HC3: BIO-ISAC Tardigrade Amplify Alert

The cybersecurity nonprofit Bioeconomy Information Sharing and Analysis Center (BIO-ISAC) recently released research on a new strand of sophisticated malware that is aggressively spreading throughout the biomanufacturing industry. They labelled this malware Tardigrade and have released a report with their analysis and recommendations. Due to its “unprecedented sophistication and stealth”, the researchers suspect an Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) is operating it. HC3 recommends that biotechnology companies specifically as well as the healthcare and public health sector (HPH) generally review this report and take appropriate action to protect their information infrastructure against the spread of Tardigrade.

(Source: HHS Cybersecurity Program – HC3)

'Sabbath' ransomware operators target critical infrastructure

Since June 2021, a relatively new ransomware group called Sabbath has been targeting critical infrastructure in the United States and Canada, including education, health and natural resources. According to a warning from Mandiant, the group previously operated under the names of Arcane and Eruption and was observed last year deploying the ROLLCOAST ransomware.

In October 2021, the group created the public naming-and-shaming site 54BB47h (Sabbath), one month after a post was discovered where the malware group announced it was looking for partners to launch a new ransomware affiliate program, Mandiant reports.

Another characteristic that makes Sabbath stand out in the crowd is the fact that the ransomware operators were observed on two occasions providing pre-configured Cobalt Strike payloads to their affiliates. While the ransomware deployment is limited in scope, the group steals large amounts of data to leverage for extortion.

(Source: Security Week)

Critical wormable security flaw found in several HP printer models

Cybersecurity researchers on Tuesday disclosed eight-year-old security flaws affecting 150 different multifunction printers (MFPs) from HP Inc that could be potentially abused by an adversary to take control of vulnerable devices, pilfer sensitive information, and infiltrate enterprise networks to mount other attacks.

The two weaknesses — collectively called Printing Shellz — were discovered and reported to HP by F-Secure Labs researchers on April 29, 2021, prompting the PC maker to issue patches earlier this month.

CVE-2021-39238's critical severity rating also stems from the fact that the vulnerability is wormable, meaning it could be exploited to self-propagate to other MFPs on the compromised network.

(Source: The Hacker News)

The InfoGram is distributed weekly to provide members of the Emergency Services Sector with information concerning the protection of their critical infrastructures.

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