Information Management: Challenges in Implementing an Electronic 
Records Archive (14-MAY-08, GAO-08-738T).			 
                                                                 
Since 2001, the National Archives and Records Administration	 
(NARA) has been working to develop a modern Electronic Records	 
Archives (ERA) system, a major information system that is	 
intended to preserve and provide access to massive volumes of all
types and formats of electronic records. The system is being	 
developed incrementally over several years; the first system	 
increment is to provide an initial set of functions, with	 
additional capabilities to be added in future increments.	 
However, in 2007, NARA's contractor acknowledged that it would	 
not be able to meet the planned date for the initial operational 
capability of the first ERA increment. GAO was asked to provide  
information on the steps that NARA has taken to respond to the	 
delays encountered in the development. To prepare this testimony,
GAO reviewed its previous work in this area, as well as the	 
preliminary results of an ongoing performance audit. For this	 
ongoing audit, GAO analyzed NARA reports, contract documents, and
other material related to the ERA development project, and	 
interviewed agency and contractor officials.			 
-------------------------Indexing Terms------------------------- 
REPORTNUM:   GAO-08-738T					        
    ACCNO:   A82117						        
  TITLE:     Information Management: Challenges in Implementing an    
Electronic Records Archive					 
     DATE:   05/14/2008 
  SUBJECT:   Archives						 
	     Electronic records 				 
	     Electronic records archive 			 
	     Information disclosure				 
	     Information management				 
	     Management information systems			 
	     Operational testing				 
	     Procurement planning				 
	     Product evaluation 				 
	     Records						 
	     Records management 				 
	     Requirements definition				 
	     Risk management					 
	     Schedule slippages 				 
	     Software						 
	     Strategic information systems planning		 
	     Strategic planning 				 
	     Systems integration				 
	     Systems testing					 

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GAO-08-738T

   

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Testimony: 

Before the Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, Government 
Information, Federal Services, and International Security, Senate 
Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs: 

United States Government Accountability Office: 

GAO: 

For Release on Delivery Expected at 3:00 p.m. EDT: 

Wednesday, May 14, 2008: 

Information Management: 

Challenges in Implementing an Electronic Records Archive: 

Statement of Linda Koontz, Director Information Management Issues: 

GAO-08-738T: 

GAO Highlights: 

Highlights of GAO-08-738T, a testimony before the Subcommittee on 
Federal Financial Management, Government Information, Federal Services, 
and International Security, Senate Committee on Homeland Security & 
Governmental Affairs. 

Why GAO Did This Study: 

Since 2001, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) has 
been working to develop a modern Electronic Records Archives (ERA) 
system, a major information system that is intended to preserve and 
provide access to massive volumes of all types and formats of 
electronic records. The system is being developed incrementally over 
several years; the first system increment is to provide an initial set 
of functions, with additional capabilities to be added in future 
increments. However, in 2007, NARAï¿½s contractor acknowledged that it 
would not be able to meet the planned date for the initial operational 
capability of the first ERA increment. 

GAO was asked to provide information on the steps that NARA has taken 
to respond to the delays encountered in the development. To prepare 
this testimony, GAO reviewed its previous work in this area, as well as 
the preliminary results of an ongoing performance audit. For this 
ongoing audit, GAO analyzed NARA reports, contract documents, and other 
material related to the ERA development project, and interviewed agency 
and contractor officials. 

What GAO Found: 

NARA is working to overcome the ERA schedule delays that occurred in 
2007 by changing to a two-pronged development strategy, but 
uncertainties remain. First, NARA developed plans to achieve an initial 
operational capability for the ERA system in June 2008 with somewhat 
reduced capabilities from those that had been planned. For this initial 
system, known as the ï¿½baseï¿½ system, software development deadlines have 
been met, and testing began on schedule. However, NARA has extended 
some test periods beyond what was originally planned, leaving less time 
at the end of the schedule for completing final activities. Although 
officials remain confident that the schedule changes will not affect 
the date of the initial operational capability, problems uncovered 
through testing could lead to its delay. Archives officials said they 
are mitigating the risk of delays by closely monitoring the testing 
process. 

Second, the development delays of 2007 put at risk NARAï¿½s plan to use 
ERA to receive the presidential records of the Bush Administration in 
January 2009. In response to this risk, NARA and its contractor are 
pursuing a parallel development of a separate part of the system that 
is to be dedicated initially to the Bush records; this part of 
ERAï¿½referred to as the ï¿½EOP (Executive Office of the President) 
systemï¿½ï¿½uses a different architecture from that of the base system: it 
is being built on a commercial product that can provide basic 
requirements for processing presidential electronic records, such as 
rapid ingest of records and ability to search content. Pursuing this as 
a separate development decouples the EOP system from dependence on the 
base system. However, completing the EOP system in time for the 
presidential transition remains uncertain, primarily because NARA and 
its contractor are still negotiating the precise scope of work and 
system requirements. These negotiations are challenging because, among 
other things, NARA does not know the exact nature of the presidential 
records that it is to receive in 2009. Although NARA and Bush 
Administration officials have held meetings on this topic, according to 
NARA officials, the Administration has not yet provided specific 
information on the volume and types of data to be transferred. System 
development is nonetheless proceeding based on NARAï¿½s volume estimates 
and the information available so far. According to NARA, developing the 
EOP system in time for the presidential transition is critical so that 
it can respond in a timely fashion to the information requirements of 
the Congress, the former and incumbent Presidents, and the courts. 

Challenges remain for the ERA program in both the near and long term. 
In the near term, NARA has to finish testing the base system, define 
the scope and requirements of the EOP system, and complete its 
development. In the long term, it plans to merge the two architectures 
of these systems into an integrated whole. Meeting these challenges 
will be important to achieving NARAï¿½s ultimate aims for the ERA system: 
preserving and providing access to all types and formats of electronic 
records. 

To view the full product, including the scope and methodology, click on 
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-08-738T]. For more 
information, contact Linda Koontz at (202) 512-6240 or [email protected] 

[End of section] 

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee: 

I appreciate the opportunity to participate in today's hearing on 
challenges and progress in overseeing the preservation of our nation's 
historical documents. As you know, since 2001, the National Archives 
and Records Administration (NARA or the Archives) has been working to 
develop a modern Electronic Records Archives (ERA) system. This major 
information system is intended to preserve and provide access to 
massive volumes of all types and formats of electronic records. ERA is 
to automate NARA's records management and archiving life cycle; the 
system is to consist of: 

* infrastructure elements, such as hardware and operating systems; 

* business applications that will support the transfer, preservation, 
dissemination, and management of all types of records and the 
preservation of and online access to electronic records; and: 

* a means for public access via the Internet. 

In view of its complexity, the system is being developed incrementally 
over several years; the first piece (or increment) of the ERA system is 
to provide an initial set of functions, with additional capabilities to 
be added in future increments. However, in 2007, NARA's contractor 
acknowledged that it would not be able to meet the planned date for the 
initial operational capability of the first ERA increment. 

As agreed, in my testimony today, I will provide information on the 
steps that NARA has taken to respond to the delays encountered in the 
development. My comments today are based on our previous work in this 
area, as well as the preliminary results of an ongoing performance 
audit, which began in February 2008 in response to a legislative 
mandate.[Footnote 1] For this ongoing performance audit, we analyzed 
NARA reports, contract documents, and other material related to the ERA 
development project, interviewed agency and contractor officials, and 
observed an ERA software demonstration. All work on which my statement 
is based was conducted in accordance with generally accepted government 
auditing standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform 
the audit to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a 
reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit 
objectives. We believe that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable 
basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. 

Results in Brief: 

NARA changed its approach to developing ERA in response to schedule 
delays that occurred in 2007, but uncertainties remain. The ERA program 
is currently pursuing a two-pronged development strategy: 

* First, NARA has developed plans to achieve an initial operational 
capability with somewhat reduced capabilities from those that had 
previously been planned; it refers to this initial system as the "base" 
ERA system. Initial operational capability for the base system is 
scheduled for the end of June 2008. Although software development 
deadlines have all been met, and testing began on schedule, NARA has 
extended some test periods beyond what was originally planned, leaving 
less time than had been planned at the end of the schedule for final 
security certification and accreditation.[Footnote 2] Although 
officials remain confident that these schedule changes will not affect 
the date for the initial operational capability, problems uncovered 
through testing could lead to its delay. According to NARA officials, 
they are mitigating the risk of delays by paying close and continuing 
attention to the testing process, through such actions as weekly 
meetings of NARA's test team. 

* The development delays in 2007 meant that the original plan to use 
ERA to receive the presidential records of the Bush Administration in 
January 2009 was put at risk. In response, NARA and its contractor are 
pursuing a parallel development of a separate part of the ERA system 
that is to be dedicated initially to these records; this part of ERA is 
referred to as the "EOP (Executive Office of the President) system." 
This system uses a different architecture from that of the base system: 
it is being built on a commercial product that provides some of the 
basic requirements for processing presidential electronic records, such 
as rapid ingest of records and ability to search content. This separate 
development decouples the EOP system from dependence on the development 
of the base system. However, it is uncertain whether the EOP system 
will be developed to the point that it can receive the Bush records in 
January 2009, primarily because NARA and its contractor are still 
negotiating the precise scope of work and system requirements. 
Finalizing the negotiations is challenging because, among other things, 
uncertainties remain regarding the exact nature of the presidential 
records that will be transferred to NARA in 2009. Although NARA and 
Bush Administration officials have held meetings on this topic, 
according to NARA, the Administration has not yet provided NARA with 
specific information on the volume and the types of data to be 
transferred. System development is nonetheless proceeding based on 
NARA's volume estimates and the information available so far. According 
to NARA, receiving the electronic presidential records and being able 
to search, process, and retrieve them immediately after the 
presidential transition is critical so that it can respond in a timely 
fashion to the information requirements of the Congress, the former and 
incumbent Presidents, and the courts. 

Challenges remain for the ERA program in both the near and long term. 
In the near term, NARA has to complete the testing of the base system 
and define the requirements and scope of the EOP system and complete 
its development. In the long term, it also plans to merge the two 
architectures of the ERA base and EOP systems into an integrated whole. 
Meeting these challenges will be important to achieving the ultimate 
aims for the ERA system: automating NARA's records management and 
archiving life cycle and preserving and providing access to all types 
and formats of electronic records. 

Background: 

The ability to find, organize, use, share, appropriately dispose of, 
and save records--the essence of records management--is vital for the 
effective functioning of the federal government. In the wake of the 
transition from paper-based to electronic processes, records are 
increasingly electronic, and the volumes of electronic records produced 
by federal agencies are vast and rapidly growing, providing challenges 
to NARA as the nation's recordkeeper and archivist. 

Besides sheer volume, other factors contributing to the challenge of 
electronic records include their complexity and their dependence on 
software and hardware. Electronic records come in many forms: text 
documents, e-mails, Web pages, digital images, videotapes, maps, 
spreadsheets, presentations, audio files, charts, drawings, databases, 
satellite imagery, geographic information systems, and more. They may 
be complex digital objects that contain embedded images (still and 
moving), drawings, sounds, hyperlinks, or spreadsheets with 
computational formulas. Some portions of electronic records, such as 
the content of dynamic Web pages, are created on the fly from databases 
and exist only during the viewing session. Others, such as e-mail, may 
contain multiple attachments, and they may be threaded (that is, 
related e-mail messages are linked into send-reply chains). 

In addition, the computer operating systems and the hardware and 
software that are used to create electronic documents can become 
obsolete. If they do, they may leave behind records that cannot be read 
without the original hardware and software. Further, the storage media 
for these records are affected by both obsolescence and decay. Media 
may be fragile, have limited shelf life, and become obsolete in a few 
years. For example, few computers today have disk drives that can read 
information stored on 8-or 5ï¿½-inch diskettes, even if the diskettes 
themselves remain readable. 

In response to these widely recognized challenges, the Archives began a 
research and development program to develop a modern archive for 
electronic records. In 2001, NARA hired a contractor to develop 
policies and plans to guide the overall acquisition of an electronic 
records system. In December 2003, the agency released a request for 
proposals for the design of ERA. In August 2004, NARA awarded two firm 
fixed-price[Footnote 3] contracts for the design phase totaling about 
$20 million--one to Harris Corporation and the other to Lockheed Martin 
Corporation. On September 8, 2005, NARA announced the selection of 
Lockheed Martin Corporation to build the ERA system. The contract with 
Lockheed is a cost plus award fee contract[Footnote 4] with a total 
value through 2012 of about $317 million. As of March 2008, the life 
cycle cost of the system through 2011 was estimated at $453 million; 
total life cycle cost includes not only the development contract costs, 
but also program management, research and development, and program 
office support, among other things. 

The ERA system is planned as a comprehensive and systematic means for 
preserving electronic records, free from dependence on any specific 
hardware or software. NARA plans for the system to manage the entire 
lifecycle of electronic records, from their ingestion into the system 
through preservation and dissemination to customers. According to the 
Archives, the most fundamental characteristic of ERA is that it must be 
able to evolve over time to allow new types of electronic records to be 
brought into the system and preserved. 

As planned, the ERA system will consist of six major components, each 
of which supports a specific business area: 

* "Ingest" enables transfer of electronic records from federal 
agencies. 

* "Managed Storage" enables stored records to be managed in a way that 
guarantees their integrity and availability. 

* "Dissemination" enables users to search descriptions and business 
data about all types of records, and to search the content of 
electronic records and retrieve them. 

* "Records Management" supports scheduling,[Footnote 5] 
appraisal,[Footnote 6] description, and requests to transfer custody 
(from agencies to the Archives) of all types of records, as well as 
ingesting and managing electronic records, including the capture of 
selected records data (such as origination date, format, and 
disposition). 

* "Preservation" enables secure and reliable storage of files in 
formats in which they were received, as well as creating backup copies 
for offsite storage. 

* "Local Services and Control" regulates how the ERA components 
communicate with each other, manages internal security, and enables 
telecommunications and system network management. 

Acquiring a major information technology system like ERA is a 
significant challenge for a relatively small organization such as NARA, 
which had no previous experience in acquiring major information 
systems. In 2002 and 2003, we pointed out this and other challenges 
facing the ERA project: for example, the solution to the electronic 
records archiving challenge had not been developed,[Footnote 7] and no 
electronic archive system existed that was comparable in complexity or 
scale to NARA's vision.[Footnote 8] Further, some key technologies 
associated with electronic document archiving and storage were not 
available commercially. As a result, ERA was technically and 
managerially complex and challenging, requiring the development of an 
advanced architecture for the conversion and preservation of electronic 
records. 

In view of this complexity, the ERA program planned to use an 
acquisition and implementation approach in which the system would be 
deployed in five separate increments. The increments were to provide 
the following capabilities: 

* Increment 1: provide the hardware, software, and communications 
needed to deploy the system; capabilities for unclassified and 
sensitive records (enabling online transfer of electronic records to 
NARA, annual transfers of records, and secure storage of electronic 
records in original formats); and support for certain records 
management functions (such as scheduling and appraisal). 

* Increment 2: provide additional capabilities, such as content 
searching, responding to Freedom of Information Act requests, and 
preservation planning.[Footnote 9] It is also to handle classified 
data. 

* Increment 3: provide public access. 

* Increments 4 and 5: provide additional preservation capability and 
storage. 

Under the ERA program plan, developed in September 2006, Increment 1 
was to take 2 years to develop, and the remaining increments were each 
to take 1 year. 

Among the requirements that ERA is to fulfill are storing and providing 
access to electronic records from past presidential administrations. 
The Presidential Records Act gives the Archivist of the United States 
responsibility for the custody, control, and preservation of 
presidential records upon the conclusion of a President's term of 
office.[Footnote 10] The act states that the Archivist has an 
affirmative duty to make such records available to the public as 
rapidly and completely as possible consistent with the provisions of 
the act. At the time of the last presidential transition, NARA met 
these requirements by recreating the Clinton Administration's computer 
systems (software and hardware) that originally held the records and 
developing simple search interfaces so that NARA personnel could search 
for requested information. NARA reported that it took about 400 days to 
process the 2 terabytes of data from the Clinton 
administration.[Footnote 11] According to NARA, it planned to use ERA 
to receive the Bush Administration's presidential records when the 
Archivist takes custody of them in January 2009. The ERA schedule had 
planned for the required capabilities (part of Increment 2) to be 
available in mid-2008. 

We have issued several reports on ERA and its development.[Footnote 12] 
Most recently, in July 2007,[Footnote 13] we reported that NARA had 
taken action to implement our prior recommendations. The agency (1) 
established a baseline and target architecture, a plan to transition 
from the baseline to the target, and an architecture review board; (2) 
revised four of five key acquisition policies and planned to comply 
with appropriate standards; and (3) developed a fiscal year 2007 
expenditure plan that contained an appropriate level and scope of 
information needed for the Congress to understand its plans and 
commitments relative to system capabilities, benefits, schedules, and 
costs. 

However, we also reported that the ERA project had experienced schedule 
delays and cost increases. Factors contributing to the delays included 
low productivity of contractor software programmers, difficulties in 
securing an acceptable contract to prepare the site that was to house 
the system, and problems with software integration. Although the 
contractor took actions to address the factors causing these delays and 
overruns, including replacing several programmers with a more 
experienced software development staff, NARA concluded that the project 
schedule should be revised so that reduced functionality would be 
available by the initial operational capability date. Subsequently, the 
schedule as of July 2007 delayed the date of the initial operational 
capability (IOC) from September 7, 2007, to March 31, 2008. NARA and 
the contractor projected that the estimated cost at completion of the 
IOC would be between $8 million and $12 million over budget. In May 
2007, NARA and the contractor were in the process of negotiating 
additional mitigating actions needed and changes to the project's cost 
and schedule. 

NARA Is Working to Overcome ERA Schedule Delays through Parallel 
Development Projects, but Uncertainties Remain: 

In response to the delays that occurred in 2007 and their effect on the 
Archives' readiness to receive the presidential records of the Bush 
Administration in January 2009, NARA developed a two-pronged strategy 
for continuing ERA development. First, it has developed plans to 
achieve IOC by June 2008 with somewhat reduced capabilities from those 
that had been planned; it refers to the system to be delivered at IOC 
as the "base" ERA system.[Footnote 14] Second, it is planning to pursue 
a parallel development of another part of the ERA system that is to be 
dedicated initially to presidential records from the Bush 
Administration; this part of ERA, which is being developed using a 
different architecture from that of the base system, is referred to as 
the "EOP (Executive Office of the President) system."[Footnote 15] When 
these developments are complete, NARA plans to merge the two 
architectures into one ERA system.[Footnote 16] 

This strategy was developed through a series of negotiations that 
followed the contractor's acknowledgement that the IOC deadline would 
not be met. In July 2007, NARA issued a cure notice[Footnote 17] to the 
developer, asking for a recovery plan that would include revised 
delivery dates, complete cost and schedule estimates, and a cost 
overrun sharing plan. In response to NARA's cure notice, the contractor 
provided a plan in August to deliver software in three iterations (or 
"drops") that would lead to IOC in May 2008; as part of this plan, the 
software to be delivered would not include all the capabilities that 
had been planned: for example, support for certain records management 
functions was postponed.[Footnote 18] After review of the contactor's 
proposed plan, NARA determined that more time would be needed to 
complete and test the software and achieve security certification and 
accreditation of the system; accordingly, it adjusted the schedule to 
put IOC at the end of June 2008. 

In addition, in September 2007, the contractor demonstrated to NARA a 
prototype for the EOP system that would address basic requirements for 
processing presidential electronic records, such as rapid ingest of 
records and ability to search content. To ensure that a system to 
receive presidential records would be available by the next change of 
Administration, NARA decided to pursue development of the contractor's 
prototype system. 

Although NARA's cure notice asked for a cost overrun sharing plan, the 
contractor did not offer such a plan. According to NARA, the contractor 
developed the prototype EOP system at its own expense, in partial 
mitigation of the cost overrun incurred in 2007. Officials also stated 
that the contractor was independently funding research on issues 
related to preservation, whose results would be applied to future work. 
In addition, the Archives applied the development contractor's 
allocated award fee to the cost overrun. According to NARA, it would 
continue to work with the development contractor to devise ways to 
mitigate the cost overrun without loss of functionality, but officials 
acknowledged that under a cost plus contract, achieving such mitigation 
was uncertain. 

In December 2007, NARA estimated a cost overrun for the development of 
ERA of about $15 million.[Footnote 19] NARA now estimates this cost 
overrun at $16.3 million. 

ERA Base System Is Generally on Schedule to Achieve IOC, but Testing 
Delays Are a Risk: 

Under the most recent plan, the base system is to achieve IOC at the 
end of June 2008; this is a 9-month delay from the earlier plan (of 
September 2006) for an IOC in September 2007. In carrying out this 
plan, the contractor met all deadlines for delivering the software 
drops, as shown in table 1. 

Table 1: Delivery of Software Drops for ERA Base System: 

Software drops with selected functions provided: Drop 1: 
* Ability to manage (create, modify, delete) new records schedules, 
legal transfer Instruments, and transfer requests; 
* Secure storage of assets placed in ERA; 
* Network security and perimeter defense; 
* Common interface for user interaction with ERA system; 
Date planned: September 28, 2007; 
Actual date: September 27, 2007. 

Software drops with selected functions provided: Drop 2: 
* Ability to manage (create, modify, delete) legacy records schedules, 
legal transfer Instruments, and transfer requests; 
* Transfer and ingest of records; 
* Backup and restore; 
* Expanded look and feel, help functions; 
Date planned: December 21, 2007; 
Actual date: December 19, 2007. 

Software drops with selected functions provided: Drop 3: 
* Verification of ingested records; 
* Enforcement of access restrictions; 
* Further expanded look and feel, help functions; 
Date planned: March 7, 2008; 
Actual date: March 5, 2008. 

Source: GAO analysis of NARA information. 

[End of table] 

In preparation for achieving IOC, NARA is currently conducting a series 
of tests aimed at verifying that ERA requirements are met. As part of 
this process, according to NARA officials, a NARA "Tiger Team" meets 
weekly to discuss testing and other activities leading to IOC and may 
adjust the schedule in response to test progress and results. Table 2 
shows the status of the testing compared to the current schedule and 
the high-level schedule provided by the contractor. 

Table 2: Progress and Changes in Test Schedule for ERA Base: 

Test milestones[A]: Test readiness review; 
Date planned as of December 4, 2007: April 11; 
Date planned as of May 2, 2008: --; 
Actual date: April 11. 

Test milestones[A]: Product acceptance test/; 
Date planned as of December 4, 2007: April 14-30; 
Date planned as of May 2, 2008: April 14-May 23; 
Actual date: Began April 14. 

Test milestones[A]: operational acceptance test[B]; 
Date planned as of December 4, 2007: [Empty]; 
Date planned as of May 2, 2008: May 19-23; 
Actual date: [Empty]. 

Test milestones[A]: Security test and evaluation; 
Date planned as of December 4, 2007: April 24-May 15; 
Date planned as of May 2, 2008: June 2-13; 
Actual date: [Empty]. 

Test milestones[A]: Certification and accreditation; 
Date planned as of December 4, 2007: May 15; 
Date planned as of May 2, 2008: June 26; 
Actual date: [Empty]. 

Test milestones[A]: Operational readiness review; 
Date planned as of December 4, 2007: (Not specified); 
Date planned as of May 2, 2008: June 27; 
Actual date: [Empty]. 

Test milestones[A]: Initial operational capability; 
Date planned as of December 4, 2007: June 30; 
Date planned as of May 2, 2008: June 27; 
Actual date: [Empty]. 

Source: GAO analysis of NARA information. 

[A] Test readiness review: Review of plan and procedures status, 
procedure deviations, known problems, requirements and performance 
metrics, test schedule, and other information relevant to beginning of 
testing phase. 

Product acceptance test: Verification that system hardware and software 
meets agreed measures of maturity and stability, among other things. 

Operational acceptance test: Verification that usability and 
accessibility meet requirements, and critical and high-priority errors 
are addressed, among other things. 

Security test and evaluation: Process to establish a high degree of 
confidence in the security of ERA and to minimize threats. 

Certification: Formal technical evaluation of the management, 
operational, and technical controls established in the system's 
security plan. 

Accreditation: Formal authorization by agency management officials for 
the system to process information. 

Operational readiness review: Review similar to test readiness review 
that occurs before IOC. 

[B] NARA's original plans showed the product acceptance test and the 
operational acceptance test being run concurrently; in later plans, the 
two tests overlap as shown. 

Note: All dates are 2008. 

[End of table] 

As the table shows, the dates for product acceptance testing and 
operational acceptance testing have been extended, and later test dates 
have been adjusted in response. According to NARA, it decided to extend 
the time to ensure adequate time for government testing review of the 
delivered systems and related documentation. Further, NARA stated that 
when the Tiger Team analyzed the contractor's high-level schedule, it 
determined that NARA's systems engineering test team required 6 weeks 
for product acceptance testing, and the end users required only 1 week 
for operational acceptance testing. Accordingly, product acceptance 
testing was extended to May 23, and operational acceptance testing was 
scheduled for the end of that period. NARA officials remain confident 
that their testing will be completed and necessary fixes made in time 
for IOC at the end of June. 

However, the ERA program faces near-term challenges in achieving IOC of 
the base system. Unforeseen problems uncovered through testing could 
lead to further delays. According to NARA, it is mitigating the risk of 
delays by paying close and continuing attention to the testing process, 
through such actions as the weekly meetings of NARA's test team. Delays 
in achieving IOC could lead to further delays in the development of ERA 
and the success of the Archives' long-term plan for electronic records 
management and preservation. 

EOP System Is Being Developed, but Completing the Development in Time 
for the Presidential Transition Is Uncertain: 

In September 2007, the contractor demonstrated to NARA a prototype for 
the EOP system, designed to show the ability to address basic 
requirements for processing presidential electronic records, such as 
rapid ingest of records and ability to search content. To ensure that 
the EOP system would be available by the change of Administration, NARA 
decided to modify its architectural approach to the EOP system by 
continuing development of the system along the lines provided by the 
contractor's prototype. However, details of the system requirements and 
capabilities, as well as the specific development plans, are still 
being defined and final contract terms negotiated while development 
continues. 

Under the new approach, the EOP system would be separately designed, 
use a dedicated system team (separate from the team working on the ERA 
base), and be developed concurrently with the work to complete the base 
system. The EOP system is to use an architecture based on a commercial 
off-the-shelf (COTS) product that supplies basic EOP requirements, 
including rapid ingest of records and immediate and flexible search of 
content.[Footnote 20] (According to NARA, the EOP system is also to use 
key elements of the base system infrastructure.) Developing the EOP 
system in this way decouples it from dependence on the completion of 
IOC for the base system. 

From October 2007 to March 2008, NARA spent $13 million on EOP system 
planning and development, of which $7 million was used to buy hardware. 
At this point, the contractor has delivered three initial software 
drops for the EOP system; it demonstrated Drop 3 software to NARA on 
April 28 and 29. (As of March 2008, two additional drops were planned, 
but the ultimate number of software drops is still being negotiated.) 

Table 3 shows the dates that the contractor is to provide the planned 
drops as well as selected functions associated with each.[Footnote 21] 
As the table shows, the first three drops were provided later than 
originally planned. 

Table 3: Software Drops for EOP System: 

Software drops with selected functions provided or planned: Drop 1: 
* Upload (ingest) information about the record or file (metadata); 
* Upload original and adapted files into COTs product; 
* Simple search and access retrieval; 
Date planned[A]: October 31, 2007; 
Actual date: December 21, 2007. 

Software drops with selected functions provided or planned: Drop 2: 
* Management of misclassified information ("digital shredding"); 
* E-mail conversion; 
* User interface for data-set-specific search; 
* User access permissions for search results; 
* Asset retrieval; 
* Strong password rules; 
* Creation of user profiles; 
* Backup and restore; 
Date planned[A]: December 14, 2007; 
Actual date: February 4, 2008. 

Software drops with selected functions provided or planned: Drop 3: 
* Full access review case management; 
* Full backup and restore; 
* User administration for entering permissions; 
* User profile deletion; 
* Session lock mechanism; 
* Integrity monitoring; 
Date planned[A]: March 28, 2008; 
Actual date: April 29, 2008. 

Software drops with selected functions provided or planned: Drop 4; 
* Generate output for access request; 
* Log management; 
* Access control service; 
Date planned[A]: May 13, 2008; 
Actual date: [Empty]. 

Software drops with selected functions provided or planned: Drop 5; 
* Expansion and refinement of established features; 
Date planned[A]: June 13, 2008; 
Actual date: [Empty]. 

Source: GAO analysis of NARA information. 

[A] Dates for drops 1 to 3 were planned as of December 4, 2007; dates 
for drops 4 and 5 were planned as of March 2008. 

[End of table] 

Although the development is continuing, challenges remain. In 
particular, because NARA and the contractor are still negotiating the 
detailed development plans and specific system requirements, the IOC 
date for the EOP system and specific details regarding functionality 
remain uncertain. 

* The scope of work and requirements for the EOP are not settled. In 
response to NARA's request for a proposal describing detailed plans for 
developing the system, the contractor delivered a proposal in February 
2008. After review, NARA asked the contractor to respond to over 200 
comments and provide a revised proposal. The revision, delivered April 
25, 2008, is currently being reviewed. NARA expects to complete its 
review on or before May 16, and it expects to reach agreement with its 
contractor no later than May 30, with a signed contract modification by 
mid-June. 

* Currently, NARA and its contractor plan to develop physically 
separate EOP system segments (or "instances") for classified and 
unclassified presidential records, with IOC for the unclassified 
instance preceding that for the classified instance. NARA is planning 
for both instances to achieve IOC by the end of 2008, but the dates are 
not settled. 

Among the difficulties of finalizing the negotiations are uncertainties 
regarding the exact nature of the presidential records that will be 
transferred to NARA in 2009. Although NARA and the Administration have 
held meetings on this topic, according to NARA, the Administration has 
not yet provided NARA with specific information required for it to plan 
for reliable ingest, indexing, and accessing of the electronic records 
involved. Both the volume and many of the data types are uncertain: 

* NARA has estimated that the volume of data from the Bush 
Administration will likely be 100 terabytes--about 50 times greater 
than that received from the Clinton Administration, and it has based 
its capacity requirements on that estimate. 

* The COTS product on which the EOP system is based supports about 370 
common data formats, so it can already accommodate some portion of the 
Bush Administration records. NARA has also obtained limited information 
regarding the e-mail and image records that will be transferred. 
However, it has not received details on the data types and formats for 
about 32 systems for which the Administration has provided brief 
descriptions, nor has it received sample data on which it could base 
its planning. According to NARA officials, if further information is 
received too late to be included in initial system development, they 
would plan, where possible, to convert the data types received to a 
generic format that would allow the EOP system to ingest and search the 
information. 

These uncertainties mean that achieving a working EOP system in time 
for the presidential transition in January 2009 will be a challenging 
goal. According to NARA, if it cannot ingest the electronic classified 
and unclassified records from the Bush Administration in a way that 
supports the search, processing, and retrieval of records immediately 
after the presidential transition, it will not be able to meet the 
requirements of the Congress, the former and incumbent Presidents, and 
the courts for information in these records in a timely fashion. 

In summary, NARA has developed a strategy to overcome the earlier ERA 
schedule delays: it has developed the software and begun testing for 
the base system, and it has begun development of the EOP system. 
However, in the near term it faces the challenge of completing the 
testing of the base system and the larger challenge of defining the 
requirements and scope of the EOP system and completing its 
development. In the long term, NARA also plans to merge the two 
architectures of the ERA base and EOP systems into a coordinated whole. 
Continuing careful oversight by NARA and the Congress will be important 
in achieving the ultimate aims for the ERA system: to automate NARA's 
records management and archiving life cycle and preserve and provide 
access to all types and formats of electronic records. 

Mr. Chairman, this concludes my testimony today. I would be happy to 
answer any questions you or other members of the subcommittee may have. 

Contacts and Acknowledgements: 

If you have any questions concerning this testimony, please contact 
Linda Koontz, Director, Information Management Issues, at (202) 512- 
6240, or [email protected]. Other individuals who made key contributions 
to this testimony were Barbara Collier, Pamlutricia Greenleaf, Charles 
C. Hinnant, Tarunkant N. Mithani, and James R. Sweetman, Jr. 

[End of section] 

Footnotes: 

[1] Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2008, Pub. L. No. 110-161, div. D, 
title V, 121 Stat. 1844, 2006 (Dec. 26, 2007). 

[2] The Office of Management and Budget requires that agency management 
officials formally authorize their information systems to process 
information and accept the risk associated with their operation. This 
management authorization (accreditation) is to be supported by a formal 
technical evaluation (certification) of the management, operational, 
and technical controls established in an information system's security 
plan. 

[3] According to the Federal Acquisition Regulation, a firm-fixed-price 
contract provides for a price that is not subject to any adjustment on 
the basis of the contractor's cost experience in performing the 
contract. This type of contract places on the contractor maximum risk 
and full responsibility for costs and resulting profit or loss. 

[4] A cost plus award fee contract is a cost reimbursement contract 
that provides for a fee consisting of a base amount fixed at inception 
of the contract plus an award amount that may be given based upon a 
judgmental evaluation by the government of contract performance. The 
theory behind these contracts is that although the government assumes 
most of the cost risk, it retains control over most or all of the 
contractor's potential fee as leverage. 

[5] A records schedule is a document that describes agency records, 
establishes a period for their retention by the agency, and provides 
mandatory instructions for what to do with them when they are no longer 
needed for current government business. Scheduling records includes, 
among other things, reviewing the organization's functions and 
recordkeeping requirements for organization and determining how long 
records are needed for conducting agency operations and meeting legal 
obligations. 

[6] Records appraisal is the process of determining the value and the 
final disposition of records, making them either temporary or 
permanent. 

[7] GAO, Records Management: National Archives and Records 
Administration's Acquisition of Major System Faces Risks, GAO-03-880 
(Washington, D.C.: Aug. 22, 2003); Information Management: Challenges 
in Managing and Preserving Electronic Records, GAO-02-586 (Washington, 
D.C.: June 17, 2002). 

[8] NARA officials believed that many relevant hardware and software 
components were available in the marketplace, and that potential 
integrators would have both an understanding of NARA's needs and 
appropriate strategies for addressing them. 

[9] Preservation planning is an ERA function that will help ensure that 
researchers have continued reliable access to records over time, 
regardless of the complexity or format of the records. 

[10] 44 U.S.C. 2203(f)(1). 

[11] A terabyte is about one trillion bytes or about 1000 gigabytes. 

[12] GAO, Records Management: Planning for the Electronic Records 
Archives Has Improved, GAO-04-927 (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 23, 2004); 
Information Management: Acquisition of the Electronic Records Archives 
Is Progressing, GAO-05-802 (Washington, D.C; July 15, 2005); Electronic 
Records Archives: The National Archives and Records Administration's 
Fiscal Year 2006 Expenditure Plan, GAO-06-906 (Washington, D.C.: Aug. 
18, 2006). 

[13] GAO, Information Management: The National Archives and Records 
Administration's Fiscal Year 2007 Expenditure Plan, GAO-07-987 
(Washington, D.C.: July 27, 2007). 

[14] In the "increment" terminology, the base ERA system generally 
corresponds to Increment 1, although certain capabilities have been 
postponed. 

[15] The EOP system generally corresponds to Increment 2 with the 
eventual addition of certain capabilities from Increment 1. 

[16] Although ERA is conceived as one system, it is to include multiple 
"instances." An instance is a single segment of the ERA system, 
consisting of the integrated system hardware and software. Separate ERA 
instances will be installed according to the classification of data: 
for example, unclassified and classified data will be housed on 
separate, unconnected instances. 

[17] A cure notice is issued by the government to inform the contractor 
that the government considers the contractor's failure a condition that 
is endangering performance of the contract. The cure notice specifies a 
period (typically 10 days) for the contractor to remedy the condition. 
If the condition is not corrected within this period, the cure notice 
states that the contractor may face the termination of its contract for 
default. 

[18] The postponed functions include expanded capabilities for 
scheduling, disposition agreements, ingest, search, and dissemination, 
as well as initial capabilities for appraisal management and life cycle 
management planning. These functions, originally planned for inclusion 
in Increment 1, were moved to a future increment. 

[19] NARA, The Electronic Records Archives Fiscal Year 2008 Expenditure 
Plan (Dec. 4, 2007). 

[20] The COTS product lacks other records management features that the 
ERA system as a whole requires, but these are not required to meet 
NARA's immediate needs for receiving and managing the presidential 
records. 

[21] The schedules in the table are for "handoff" dates: when the 
contractor provides the software but before NARA completes its review 
and accepts it. 

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