Interagency Operations Centers bring together federal, state, local, tribal, international, public and private stakeholders in a multi-agency cooperative environment. IOCs move tasks like targeting risks, assigning resources and monitoring operations in the maritime environment from a single-agency approach with occasional ad hoc cooperation to a predictable and repeatable integrated effort conducted by a coalition of multi-agency port partners.
IOC partners can use WatchKeeper to share targeting, intelligence and scheduling information to improve situational awareness, uncover gaps in planned and ongoing operations, and reduce duplication of effort among agencies.
The WatchKeeper system aids the IOC community in actively collecting port activity information to develop real-time awareness, evaluate threat, and deploy finite resources to the right places.
The WatchKeeper system is:
- Cooperative: A common user interface receives, aggregates and displays data from existing sources/authoritative Coast Guard and U.S. Customs and Border Protection systems into a common viewer, allowing a real-time view of data by all users
- Secure: Enables a unified coalition of port agencies to access and share information in real time; can control data and user access through user role management; and provides sensitive but unclassified system
- Accessible: Web-based and accessible from any location with computer, Internet access and login credential
WatchKeeper user feedback has played a vital role in system development and progression since 2010. Maturing WatchKeeper system functionality remains a priority for the IOC program and feedback will continue to inform updates and modifications to the system. Migration to an open architecture framework is planned to improve management of services.