Homeland security's IT cost: $2.9 billion

The U.S. government spent at least $2.9 billion in 2002 on information technology related to homeland security and will spend at least that amount again this year, Congress' auditing arm said. In a report released Tuesday, the General Accounting Office also said the two-year, $5.8 billion figure may be low because of potential IT-related costs not captured in the report.

Such costs include multiagency IT infrastructure, new intelligence systems and funding for existing agency missions that seem related to homeland security, such as efforts by the Department of Defense and the Federal Aviation Administration.

The GAO said that for fiscal 2003, roughly $26.3 billion in IT funding has been requested for the Defense Department. That's half of the federal government's overall $52.6 billion IT funding request for the year. Federal spending on IT was $48.6 billion last year, the report said.

Total funding on homeland security is slated to rise to $37.8 billion this year from $30.3 billion in fiscal 2002, according to the report. Fiscal 2002 ended Sept. 30. The GAO report was called for by the Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, part of the Senate's Committee on Governmental Affairs. The subcommittee's chair is Carl Levin, D-Mich.

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