[Federal Register Volume 82, Number 73 (Tuesday, April 18, 2017)]
[Notices]
[Pages 18289-18291]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2017-07741]
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DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
[Docket No. ED-2017-ICCD-0052]
Agency Information Collection Activities; Comment Request;
Revision of the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES)
Confidentiality Pledges Under Confidential Information Protection and
Statistical Efficiency Act (CIPSEA) and Education Sciences Reform Act
of 2002 (ESRA 2002)
AGENCY: National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), Department of
Education (ED).
ACTION: Notice.
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SUMMARY: The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) is
announcing revisions to the confidentiality pledge(s) it provides to
its respondents under the Confidential Information Protection and
Statistical Efficiency Act (CIPSEA) and under the Education Sciences
Reform Act of 2002 (ESRA 2002). These revisions are required by the
passage and implementation of provisions of the Federal Cybersecurity
Enhancement Act of 2015, which permits and requires the Secretary of
Homeland Security to provide Federal civilian agencies' information
technology systems with cybersecurity protection for their Internet
traffic. More details on this announcement are presented in the
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section below.
DATES: Interested persons are invited to submit comments on or before
June 19, 2017.
ADDRESSES: To access and review all the documents related to the
information collection listed in this notice, please use http://www.regulations.gov by searching the Docket ID number ED-2017-ICCD-
0052. Comments submitted in response to this notice should be submitted
electronically through the Federal eRulemaking Portal at http://www.regulations.gov by selecting the Docket ID number or via postal
mail, commercial delivery, or hand delivery. Please note that comments
submitted by fax or email and those submitted after the comment period
will not be accepted. Written requests for information or comments
submitted by postal mail or delivery should be addressed to the
Director of the Information Collection Clearance Division, U.S.
Department of Education, 400 Maryland Avenue SW., LBJ, Room 224-84,
Washington, DC 20202-4537.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Dr. Cleo Redline by telephone at 202-
245-7695 (this is not a toll-free number); by email at
[email protected]; or by mail at the National Center for Education
Statistics, Potomac Center Plaza, 550 12th Street SW., Washington DC
20202. Because of delays in the receipt of regular mail related to
security screening, respondents are encouraged to use electronic
communications.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Federal statistics provide key information
that the Nation uses to measure its performance and make informed
choices about education, employment, health, investments, budgets,
taxes, and a host of other significant topics. The overwhelming
majority of Federal surveys are conducted on a voluntary basis.
Respondents, ranging from businesses to households to institutions, may
choose whether or not to provide the requested information. Many of the
most valuable Federal statistics come from surveys that ask for highly
sensitive information such as proprietary business data from companies
or particularly personal information or practices from individuals.
Confidential Information and Protection and Statistical Efficiency Act
(CIPSEA)
Strong and trusted confidentiality and exclusively statistical use
pledges under the Confidential Information Protection and Statistical
Efficiency Act (CIPSEA) and similar statistical confidentiality pledges
are effective and necessary in honoring the trust that businesses,
individuals, and institutions, by their responses, place in statistical
agencies. Under CIPSEA and similar statistical confidentiality
protection statutes, many Federal statistical agencies make statutory
pledges that the information respondents provide will be seen only by
statistical agency personnel or their sworn agents, and will be used
only for statistical purposes. CIPSEA and similar statutes protect the
confidentiality of information that agencies collect solely for
statistical purposes and under a pledge of confidentiality. These acts
protect such statistical information from administrative, law
enforcement, taxation, regulatory, or any other non-statistical use and
immunize the information submitted to statistical agencies from legal
process. Moreover, many of these statutes carry criminal penalties of a
Class E felony (fines up to $250,000, or up to five years in prison, or
both) for conviction of a knowing and willful unauthorized disclosure
of covered information.
As part of the Consolidated Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2016
signed on December 17, 2015, the Congress included the Federal
Cybersecurity Enhancement Act of 2015 (6 U.S.C. 151). This Act, among
other provisions, permits and requires the Secretary of Homeland
Security to provide Federal civilian agencies' information technology
systems with cybersecurity protection for their Internet traffic. The
technology currently used to provide this protection against cyber
malware is known as Einstein 3A; it electronically searches Internet
traffic in and out of Federal civilian agencies in real time for
malware signatures.
When such a signature is found, the Internet packets that contain
the malware signature are shunted aside for further inspection by
Department of Homeland Security (DHS) personnel. Because it is possible
that such packets entering or leaving a statistical agency's
information technology system may contain a small portion of
confidential statistical data, statistical agencies can no longer
promise their respondents that their responses will be seen only by
statistical agency personnel or their sworn agents.
Accordingly, DHS and Federal statistical agencies, in cooperation
with their parent departments, have developed a Memorandum of Agreement
for the installation of Einstein 3A cybersecurity protection technology
to monitor their Internet traffic.
However, many current CIPSEA and similar statistical
confidentiality pledges promise that respondents' data will be seen
only by statistical agency personnel or their sworn agents. Since it is
possible that DHS personnel could see some portion of those
confidential data in the course of examining the suspicious Internet
packets identified by Einstein 3A sensors, statistical agencies need to
revise their confidentiality pledges to reflect this process change.
[[Page 18290]]
Therefore, the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) is
providing this notice to alert the public to these confidentiality
pledge revisions in an efficient and coordinated fashion.
Under CIPSEA, the following is the revised statistical
confidentiality pledge for applicable NCES data collections, with the
new line added to address the new cybersecurity monitoring activities
bolded for reference only:
The information you provide will be used for statistical
purposes only. In accordance with the Confidential Information
Protection provisions of Title V, Subtitle A, Public Law 107-347 and
other applicable Federal laws, your responses will be kept
confidential and will not be disclosed in identifiable form to
anyone other than employees or agents. By law, every NCES employee
as well as every agent, such as contractors and NAEP coordinators,
has taken an oath and is subject to a jail term of up to 5 years, a
fine of $250,000, or both if he or she willfully discloses ANY
identifiable information about you. Electronic submission of your
information will be monitored for viruses, malware, and other
threats by Federal employees and contractors in accordance with the
Cybersecurity Enhancement Act of 2015.
The following listing shows the current NCES Paperwork Reduction
Act (PRA) OMB number and information collection title whose CIPSEA
confidentiality pledge will change to reflect the statutory
implementation of DHS' Einstein 3A monitoring for cybersecurity
protection purposes:
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OMB control No. Information collection title
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1850-0928.................... National Assessment of Educational
Progress (NAEP) 2017.
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Education Sciences Reform Act of 2002 (ESRA 2002)
NCES sample surveys are governed by additional laws, one of which
is the Education Sciences Reform Act of 2002 (ESRA 2002) (20 U.S.C.
9573). Under ESRA 2002, the information respondents provide can be seen
only by statistical agency personnel or their sworn agents, and may not
be disclosed, or used, in identifiable form for any other purpose,
except in the case of an authorized investigation or prosecution of an
offense concerning national or international terrorism. Under ESRA
2002, the Attorney General is permitted to petition a court of
competent jurisdiction for an ex parte order requiring the Secretary of
Education to provide data relevant to an authorized investigation or
prosecution of an offense concerning national or international
terrorism. Thus, ESRA 2002 affords many of the same protections as
CIPSEA, that is, surveys conducted under ESRA 2002 are protected from
administrative, taxation, regulatory, and many other non-statistical
uses and the disclosure of information carries criminal penalties of a
Class E felony (fines up to $250,000, or up to five years in prison, or
both) for conviction of a knowing and willful unauthorized disclosure
of covered information for any non-statistical uses, except as noted
previously, in the case of an authorized investigation concerning
national or international terrorism.
As part of the Consolidated Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2016
signed on December 17, 2015, the Congress included the Federal
Cybersecurity Enhancement Act of 2015 (6 U.S.C. 151). This Act, among
other provisions, permits and requires the Secretary of Homeland
Security to provide Federal civilian agencies' information technology
systems with cybersecurity protection for their Internet traffic. Since
it is possible that DHS personnel could see some portion of the
confidential data collected under ESRA 2002 in the course of examining
the suspicious Internet packets identified by Einstein 3A sensors, the
National Center for Education Statistics needs to revise the
confidentiality pledges made under ESRA 2002 to reflect this process
change.
Therefore, the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) is
providing this notice to alert the public to these confidentiality
pledge revisions in an efficient and coordinated fashion.
Under ESRA 2002, the following is the revised statistical
confidentiality pledge for applicable NCES data collections, with the
new line added to address the new cybersecurity monitoring activities
bolded for reference only:
All of the information you provide may be used only for statistical
purposes and may not be disclosed, or used, in identifiable form for
any other purpose except as required by law (20 U.S.C. 9573 and 6
U.S.C. 151)
The following listing shows the current NCES Paperwork Reduction
Act (PRA) OMB numbers and information collection titles whose ESRA 2002
confidentiality pledge will change to reflect the statutory
implementation of DHS' Einstein 3A monitoring for cybersecurity
protection purposes:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
OMB control No. Information collection title
------------------------------------------------------------------------
1850-0631.................... 2012/17 Beginning Postsecondary Students
Longitudinal Study (BPS:12/17).
1850-0695.................... Trends in International Mathematics and
Science Study (TIMSS 2019) Pilot Test.
1850-0733.................... Fast Response Survey System (FRSS) 108:
Career and Technical Education (CTE)
Programs in Public School Districts.
1850-0755.................... Program for International Student
Assessment (PISA 2018) Field Test.
1850-0852.................... High School Longitudinal Study of 2009
(HSLS:09) Second Follow-up Main Study.
1850-0870.................... Program for the International Assessment
of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) 2017
National Supplement.
1850-0888.................... 2018 Teaching and Learning International
Survey (TALIS 2018) Field Test.
1850-0911.................... Middle Grades Longitudinal Study of 2017-
18 (MGLS:2017) Operational Field Test
(OFT) and Recruitment for Main Study
Base-year.
1850-0923.................... ED School Climate Surveys (EDSCLS)
National Benchmark Study.
1850-0929.................... International Computer and Information
Literacy Study (ICILS 2018) Field Test.
1850-0931.................... NCER-NPSAS Grant Study--Connecting
Students with Financial Aid (CSFA) 2017:
Testing the Effectiveness of FAFSA
Interventions on College Outcomes.
1850-0932.................... NCER-NPSAS Grant Study--Financial Aid
Nudges 2017: A National Experiment to
Increase Retention of Financial Aid and
College Persistence.
1850-0934.................... Principal Follow-Up Survey (PFS 2016-17)
to the National Teacher and Principal
Survey (NTPS 2015-16).
1850-0803 v.174.............. The National Assessment of Educational
Progress (NAEP) Oral Reading Fluency
Pilot Study 2017.
[[Page 18291]]
1850-0803 v.176.............. National Assessment of Educational
Progress (NAEP) Survey Assessments
Innovations Lab (SAIL) English Language
Arts (ELA) Collaboration and Inquiry
Study 2017.
1850-0803 v.177.............. 2017 Integrated Postsecondary Education
Data System (IPEDS) Time Use and Burden
Cognitive Interviews Round 1.
1850-0803 v.178.............. ED School Climate Surveys (EDSCLS)
Additional Item Cognitive Interviews--
Set 2 Round 2.
1850-0803 v.179.............. National Assessment of Educational
Progress (NAEP) Pretesting of Survey and
Cognitive Items for Pilot in 2017 and
2018.
1850-0803 v.180.............. National Assessment of Educational
Progress (NAEP) 2017 Feasibility Study
of Middle School Transcript Study
(MSTS).
1850-0803 v.181.............. National Assessment of Educational
Progress (NAEP) Digitally Based
Assessments (DBA) Usability Study 2017-
18.
1850-0803 v.182.............. 2017 National Household Education Survey
(NHES) Web Data Collection Test.
1850-0803 v.186.............. National Household Education Surveys
Program 2019 (NHES:2019) Focus Groups
with Parents of Students using Virtual
Education.
1850-0803 v.187.............. National Household Education Surveys
Program (NHES) 2017 Web Test Debriefing
Interviews for Parents of Homeschoolers.
1850-0803 v.189.............. 2017-2018 National Teacher and Principal
Survey (NTPS) Portal Usability Testing.
1850-0803 v.191.............. NCER- NPSAS Grant Study--Connecting
Students with Financial Aid (CSFA) 2017
Cognitive Testing.
1850-0803 v.190.............. International Early Learning Study (IELS
2018) Cognitive Items Trial.
1850-0803 v.164.............. National Assessment of Educational
Progress (NAEP) 2019 Science Items
Pretesting.
1850-0803 v.170.............. National Assessment of Educational
Progress (NAEP) Survey Assessments
Innovations Lab (SAIL) Pretesting
Activities: Virtual World for English
Language Arts Assessment.
1850-0803 v.175.............. National Assessment of Educational
Progress (NAEP) Science Questionnaire
Cognitive Interviews 2017.
1850-0803 v.184.............. NCER- NPSAS Grant Study--Connecting
Students with Financial Aid (CSFA) 2017
Focus Groups.
1850-0803 v.183.............. NCER-NPSAS Grant Study--Financial Aid
Nudges 2017 Focus Groups.
1850-0803 v.185.............. The School Survey on Crime and Safety
(SSOCS) Principals Focus Groups.
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Title of Collection: Revision of the National Center for Education
Statistics (NCES) Confidentiality Pledges under Confidential
Information Protection and Statistical Efficiency Act (CIPSEA) and
Education Sciences Reform Act of 2002 (ESRA 2002).
OMB Control Number: 1850-0937.
Type of Review: An extension of an existing information collection.
Affected Public: Survey respondents to applicable NCES information
collections.
Total Respondents: Unchanged from current collections.
Frequency: Unchanged from current collections.
Total Responses: Unchanged from current collections.
Average Time per Response: Unchanged from current collections.
Estimated Total Burden Hours: Unchanged from current collections.
Estimated Total Cost: Unchanged from current collections.
Abstract: Under 44 U.S.C. 3506(e), and 44 U.S.C. 3501 (note), the
National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) is announcing revisions
to the confidentiality pledge(s) it provides to its respondents under
the Confidential Information Protection and Statistical Efficiency Act
(44 U.S.C. 3501 (note)) (CIPSEA) and under the Education Sciences
Reform Act of 2002 (ESRA 2002). These revisions are required by the
passage and implementation of provisions of the Federal Cybersecurity
Enhancement Act of 2015 (6 U.S.C. 151), which permits and requires the
Secretary of Homeland Security to provide Federal civilian agencies'
information technology systems with cybersecurity protection for their
Internet traffic.
Dated: April 12, 2017.
Kate Mullan,
Acting Director, Information Collection Clearance Division, Office of
the Chief Privacy Officer, Office of Management.
[FR Doc. 2017-07741 Filed 4-17-17; 8:45 am]
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