In the United States, fusion centers are designed to promote

information sharing Information exchange or information sharing means that people or other entities pass information from one to another. This could be done electronically or through certain systems. These are terms that can either refer to bidirectional '' inform ...

at the federal level between agencies such as the

Federal Bureau of Investigation The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...

, the

U.S. Department of Homeland Security The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the U.S. federal executive department responsible for public security, roughly comparable to the interior, home, or public security ministries in other countries. Its missions involv ...

, the

U.S. Department of Justice The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a federal executive department of the U.S. government that oversees the domestic enforcement of federal laws and the administration of justice. It is equi ...

, and state, local, and tribal law enforcement. , the U.S. Department of Homeland Security recognized 79 fusion centers. Fusion centers may also be affiliated with an emergency operations center that responds in the event of a disaster. The National Network of Fusion Centers was established after the

September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...

to allow collaboration across jurisdictions in order to respond to criminal and

terrorist Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of violence against non-combatants to achieve political or ideological aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violence during peacetime or in the context of war aga ...

activity. It is a decentralized, distributed, self-organizing network of individual fusion centers and their respective partners within each center's area of responsibility. The process is a method of managing the flow of information and intelligence across levels and sectors of government to integrate information for analysis. Fusion centers rely on the active involvement of state, local, tribal, and federal law enforcement agencies—and sometimes on non–law enforcement agencies—to provide intelligence for their analysis. The intent is that, as the diversity of information sources increases, there will be more accurate and robust analysis that can be disseminated as intelligence. The effectiveness of this strategy is disputed. Reports by the US House of Representatives Committee on Homeland Security have found fusion centers to be a national asset, though they have at times raised concerns about the ability to evaluate their effectiveness. A 2012 Senate report analyzed 13 months of fusion center reports and found no instances where they helped uncover or prevent a terror attack. The

American Civil Liberties Union The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is an American nonprofit civil rights organization founded in 1920. ACLU affiliates are active in all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. The budget of the ACLU in 2024 was $383 million. T ...

and the Department of Homeland Security have separately raised concerns about the threats fusion centers pose to

privacy rights The right to privacy is an element of various legal traditions that intends to restrain governmental and private actions that threaten the privacy of individuals. Over 185 national constitutions mention the right to privacy. Since the global ...

such as excessive secrecy, little oversight, and mission creep. The actions of individual fusion centers have also been criticized for actions such as labeling universities as terrorism threats, targeting third-party candidates and supporters as potential militia members, and incorrectly blaming a faulty water pump on Russian hackers.

Operations

A fusion center is a collaborative effort between law enforcement agencies to share resources, expertise, and information in order to detect criminal and terrorist activity. The goal is to integrate the information each agency has together to prevent security gaps due to lack of communication. A fusion center is typically organized by combining representatives from different federal, state, local, and tribal law enforcement agencies into one physical location. Some fusion centers gather information not only from government sources, but also from their partners in the private sector. Each representative is intended to report information from their agency and use that agency-specific information to contribute to the collective analysis of the group. Similarly, the representative reports the analytic products and threat information back to their home agency. State and local police departments provide both space and resources for the majority of fusion centers. The analysts working there can be drawn from a range of agencies and organizations, including DHS, FBI, Customs and Border Protection, Drug Enforcement Administration, Coast Guard, National Guard, Highway Patrol, state-level Departments of Corrections, local police, and the private sector. A number of fusion centers operate tip hotlines and also invite relevant information from public employees, such as sanitation workers or firefighters. Fusion centers are often confused with investigative support centers or emergency operations centers. Investigative support centers, for example, respond to inquiries and requests from investigators, whereas fusion centers have the responsibility of proactively gathering intelligence, analyzing that information, and then disseminating it to their local, state and federal partners. Fusion centers are also constantly staffed, unlike emergency operations centers which are minimally staffed until a crisis.

The National Fusion Center Association

The NFCA is an association that represents all of the fusion centers located across the country that make up the National Network. It is headed by an executive board composed of a president, vice president, executive director, treasurer, secretary, and two regional co-chairs that represent fusion centers from the North East, South East, Central, and West regions of the country. The mission of the NFCA is as follows: "To represent the interests of state and major urban area fusion centers, as well as associated interests of states, tribal nations, and units of local government, in order to promote the development and sustainment of fusion centers to enhance public safety; encourage effective, efficient, ethical, lawful, and professional intelligence and information sharing; and prevent and reduce the harmful effects of crime and terrorism on victims, individuals, and communities." Below are the overarching goals of the NFCA in their support of the National Network, and clearly define their existence as an association. * Provide an independent and consolidated voice for state and major urban area fusion centers; * Maintain the focus of state, tribal, local, and federal governments on the needs of the fusion centers; * Represent fusion center concerns to the federal government through an education process; * Provide support for the development of effective fusion center policy for the nation's state and local government elected officials and tribal leaders; * Serve as a catalyst for the careful consideration and promotion of effective and efficient fusion center policies and practices; * Advocate for the commitment of adequate resources to support a national, integrated network of state and major urban area fusion centers; and * Coordinate between and among the different branches and levels of government and promote broad philosophical agreement. The NFCA have their own website located at www.nfcausa.org, which contains contact information for each of the 79 fusion centers, a tool to submit a Suspicious Activity Report, and general news on the works of fusion centers across the country.

NFCA annual training event

The NFCA hosts an annual training event in Alexandria, Virginia.

History of the fusion center concept

The Fusion Center was originally called Terrorism Early Warning Group. It began in 1997. The author was a Los Angeles County Deputy Sheriff Sergeant John Sullivan. The concept was bring together law enforcement, LA County Health Services, and the Fire Service to acquire and share intelligence related to domestic and international terrorism. The TEWG expanded to include representatives from state and federal agencies who staffed and contributed and shared intelligence collected from their agencies. The TEWG eventually evolved into Fusion Centers throughout the nation.The fusion center concept was created as a result of the September 11 report, in an attempt by the Department of Homeland Security to create better communication and cooperation between state, local, and territorial law enforcement with federal law enforcement entities including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Department of Homeland Security and several others. With domestic and foreign threats constantly changing, the strategies used by each Fusion Center have to be defined, and altered, which calls for a specific plans and guidelines as to how to best protect the homeland. The National Strategy for Information Sharing and Safeguarding, as well as The National Strategy for Information Sharing are two documents that influenced the workings of the Fusion Center network, and defined a broad strategy for a more proactive information sharing network. The NFCA alongside several other federal and local law enforcement associations formulated the "Baseline Capabilities for State and Major Fusion Centers" as well as the "National Strategy for the National Network of Fusion Centers" are documents that defined a clear understanding of the role of Fusion Centers as well as time sensitive goals they should achieve. The National Strategy is constantly being developed as time passes to meet the needs of the changing environment of national security. Additionally, a "Cyber Appendix" was added to the Baseline Capabilities document, that defines the roles and operational capabilities of Fusion Centers to fight cyber crime that effects their areas of responsibility.

Examples

Hurricane Irma

In 2017,

Hurricane Irma Hurricane Irma was an extremely powerful and devastating tropical cyclone that was the first Category 5 hurricane to strike the Leeward Islands on record, followed by Hurricane Maria, Maria two weeks later. At the time, it was considered ...

hit several of the islands off the coast of the US, including the Virgin Islands. A couple from Falls Church, Virginia, had been trapped in their vacation home near St. John due to damage from the hurricane. They had no means to escape their island, no electricity, and a limited amount of water. After their daughter found a video that a pilot had taken from above the island, she noticed the landslide that had trapped her parents in their home. She reached out to congressmen, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Department of Defense, and the Red Cross, but the resources were not available to provide any assistance. The executive director of the National Fusion Center Association, Glenn Archer, was alerted of the family's situation, and reached out to the fusion center in the Virgin Islands, and after working through the night the director of the Virgin Islands Fusion Center was able to locate the couple and deploy an FBI SWAT team to their location. The operation was successful, and the couple was able to return to Virginia and be reunited with their daughter. At the time of the rescue, the couple had been trapped for seven days, and had run out of potable water.

Congressional reports

The United States Congress in its oversight capacity has issued multiple reports on fusion centers in the United States. The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations released a report in 2012 criticising the usefulness of fusion centers and practices. In a review of 13 months of fusion center reports, the Subcommittee found no examples of a fusion center uncovering a terrorist threat, and they criticized the use of reporting quotas for leading to a high rate of useless information being reported on by the centers. An example highlighted in the Senate report was a California fusion center report on the

Mongols Motorcycle Club The Mongols Motorcycle Club, also known as the Mongol Brotherhood or Mongol Nation, is an international outlaw motorcycle club. Originally formed in Montebello, California, in 1969, the club is headquartered in Southern California.escribedin this report," and that "The advice given to the groups' members is protected by the First Amendment." The Senate report argued that the report quality was diminished by the DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis imposing a quota on the number of reports that must be filed by the fusion centers.Robert O'Harrow, Jr
"DHS 'fusion centers' portrayed as pools of ineptitude, civil liberties intrusions"
''The Washington Post'', October 2, 2012. The report noted that of the 386 unclassified reports it reviewed, nearly 300 had no connection to terrorists or terrorism threats. The Senate committee estimated that as much as $1.4 billion had been spent on the fusion centers. Matthew Chandler, a spokesperson for the DHS, said that "In preparing the report, the committee refused to review relevant data, including important intelligence information pertinent to their findings," and that the "report fundamentally misunderstands the role of the federal government in supporting fusion centers and overlooks the significant benefits of this relationship to both state and local law enforcement and the federal government." A 2013 report by the House Homeland Security committee reported on visits to 32 of the 78 fusion centers and 9 committee hearings. The Committee found that fusion centers were an asset, but needed improved federal assistance to reach their full potential. The lack of a State-focused, national strategy for fusion centers was highlighted as a major barrier to the effectiveness of fusion centers. The report notes that fusion centers do not universally focus on the implications of intelligence for national security, and while fusion centers should fulfill their State and local missions, they must do so in a way that requires analysis with an eye towards counterterrorism. The Committee takes issue with the previous performance metrics which focused on quantity rather than quality of reports, and this inability to assess the quality of reports makes evaluating the value of fusion centers difficult. They point out that the uncertainty of annual budgets due to the funding structure makes long term planning difficult. A 2017 report by the House Homeland Security committee reported on interviews with staff from 15 fusion centers and 68 responses to its survey of the 78 fusion centers. The report highlight the growth of fusion center operations since its previous 2013 report and highlighted particular challenges which threaten to reduce the effectiveness of fusion centers. The report highlighted the expanded efforts to include emergency personnel such as fire department and emergency medical services. Respondents to the survey raised concerns about their centers' limited access to unclassified and classified information, and the Committee critiqued the level of technical support offered to fusion centers in order to handle cyber threats. The report took issue with the recent decisions of

social media Social media are interactive technologies that facilitate the Content creation, creation, information exchange, sharing and news aggregator, aggregation of Content (media), content (such as ideas, interests, and other forms of expression) amongs ...

companies to restrict access to their data by fusion centers.

Concerns

There are a number of documented concerns about fusion centers, including relative ineffectiveness at counterterrorism activities, the potential to be used for secondary purposes unrelated to counterterrorism, and their links to violations of

civil liberties Civil liberties are guarantees and freedoms that governments commit not to abridge, either by constitution, legislation, or judicial interpretation, without due process. Though the scope of the term differs between countries, civil liberties of ...

of American citizens and others. One such fusion center has been involved with spying on anti-war and peace activists as well as

anarchists Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that seeks to abolish all institutions that perpetuate authority, coercion, or hierarchy, primarily targeting the state and capitalism. Anarchism advocates for the replacement of the state w ...

Washington state Washington, officially the State of Washington, is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is often referred to as Washington State to distinguish it from the national capital, both named after George Washington ...

. David Rittgers of the

Cato Institute The Cato Institute is an American libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Ed Crane, Murray Rothbard, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Koch Industries.Koch ...

has noted:

a long line of fusion center and DHS reports labeling broad swaths of the public as a threat to national security. The North Texas Fusion System labeled
Muslim Muslims () are people who adhere to Islam, a Monotheism, monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God ...
lobbyists as a potential threat; a DHS analyst in Wisconsin thought both pro- and anti-abortion activists were worrisome; a Pennsylvania homeland security contractor watched environmental activists, Tea Party groups, and a Second Amendment rally; the Maryland State Police put anti-death penalty and anti-war activists in a federal terrorism database; a fusion center in Missouri thought that all
third-party Third party may refer to: Business * Third-party source, a supplier company not owned by the buyer or seller * Third-party beneficiary, a person who could sue on a contract, despite not being an active party * Third-party insurance, such as a veh ...
voters and
Ron Paul Ronald Ernest Paul (born August 20, 1935) is an American author, activist, and politician who served as the U.S. representative for Texas's 22nd congressional district from 1976 to 1977, and again from 1979 to 1985, as well as for Texas' ...
supporters were a threat; and the Department of Homeland Security described half of the American political spectrum as "
right wing Right-wing politics is the range of Ideology#Political ideologies, political ideologies that view certain social orders and Social stratification, hierarchies as inevitable, natural, normal, or desirable, typically supporting this position b ...
extremists."

A 2007

ACLU The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is an American nonprofit civil rights organization founded in 1920. ACLU affiliates are active in all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. The budget of the ACLU in 2024 was $383 million. ...

report raised concerns with four areas of fusion center aspects, the first of which was that they suffered from "ambiguous lines of authority", meaning that the fusion process "allows the authorities to manipulate differences in federal, state and local laws to maximize information collection while evading accountability and oversight through the practice of 'policy shopping'." The ACLU was also concerned with the private sector and military participation in the surveillance of US citizens through these fusion centers. Finally, the ACLU report argued that fusion centers were likely to engage in poorly contained

data mining Data mining is the process of extracting and finding patterns in massive data sets involving methods at the intersection of machine learning, statistics, and database systems. Data mining is an interdisciplinary subfield of computer science and ...

because the "Federal fusion center guidelines encourage whole sale data collection and manipulation processes that threaten privacy" and that the centers were "hobbled by excessive secrecy". An updated ACLU report in 2008 argued that the fusion centers were creating a "total surveillance society" in the US. An ACLU spokesperson compared the fusion centers initiative with Operation TIPS because of the involvement of private Terrorism Liaison Officers.

MIAC report

Missouri Information Analysis Center (MIAC) made news in 2009 for targeting supporters of

third party Third party may refer to: Business * Third-party source, a supplier company not owned by the buyer or seller * Third-party beneficiary, a person who could sue on a contract, despite not being an active party * Third-party insurance, such as a veh ...

candidates,

Ron Paul Ronald Ernest Paul (born August 20, 1935) is an American author, activist, and politician who served as the U.S. representative for Texas's 22nd congressional district from 1976 to 1977, and again from 1979 to 1985, as well as for Texas' ...

supporters,

anti-abortion Anti-abortion movements, also self-styled as pro-life movements, are involved in the abortion debate advocating against the practice of abortion and its Abortion by country, legality. Many anti-abortion movements began as countermovements in r ...

activists, and conspiracy theorists as potential

militia A militia ( ) is a military or paramilitary force that comprises civilian members, as opposed to a professional standing army of regular, full-time military personnel. Militias may be raised in times of need to support regular troops or se ...

members.

Anti-war An anti-war movement is a social movement in opposition to one or more nations' decision to start or carry on an armed conflict. The term ''anti-war'' can also refer to pacifism, which is the opposition to all use of military force during conf ...

activists and Islamic lobby groups were targeted in Texas, drawing criticism from the

. According to the

Department of Homeland Security The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the U.S. federal executive department responsible for public security, roughly comparable to the interior, home, or public security ministries in other countries. Its missions invol ...

e Privacy Office has identified a number of risks to privacy presented by the fusion center program: # Justification for fusion centers # Ambiguous Lines of Authority, Rules, and Oversight # Participation of the Military and the Private Sector #
Data Mining Data mining is the process of extracting and finding patterns in massive data sets involving methods at the intersection of machine learning, statistics, and database systems. Data mining is an interdisciplinary subfield of computer science and ...
# Excessive Secrecy # Inaccurate or
incomplete information In economics and game theory, complete information is an economic situation or game in which knowledge about other market participants or players is available to all participants. The utility functions (including risk aversion), payoffs, strategies ...
#
Mission Creep Mission creep is the gradual or incremental expansion of an intervention, project or mission, beyond its original scope, focus or goals, a ratchet effect spawned by initial success. Mission creep is usually considered undesirable due to how each ...

2009 Virginia terrorism threat assessment

In early April 2009, the Virginia Fusion Center came under criticism for publishing a terrorism threat assessment which stated that certain universities are potential hubs for terror related activity. The report targeted historically black colleges and identified

hacktivism Hacktivism (or hactivism; a portmanteau of ''hack'' and ''activism''), is the use of computer-based techniques such as hacking as a form of civil disobedience to promote a political agenda or social change. A form of Internet activism with roots ...

as a form of terrorism.

2011 Illinois fusion center finds water pump was "hacked"; the FBI disagrees

A November 2011 report by the Illinois fusion center was criticized for alleging that

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

hacked and deliberately disabled a water pump of the

municipal water system A water supply network or water supply system is a system of engineered hydrologic and hydraulic components that provide water supply. A water supply system typically includes the following: # A drainage basin (see Water purification#Sources of ...

in Illinois. The Senate report writes: "Apparently aware of how important such an event could have been had it been real, DHS intelligence officials included the false allegations—stated as fact—in a daily intelligence briefing that went to Congress and the intelligence community." A subsequent FBI investigation found however that: "The only fact that they got right was that a water pump in a small Illinois water district had burned out."

Washington State Fusion Center

A lawsuit alleges that a Washington State Fusion Center employee added members of the Port Militarization Resistance to the domestic terrorists list on unsubstantiated grounds.

References

External links

List of Fusion Centers

Fusion Center Guidelines
issued by the US Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs
Information Fusion Centers and Privacy
Information related to Fusion Centers and privacy.

Electronic Privacy Information Center The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) is an independent nonprofit research center established in 1994 to protect privacy, freedom of expression, and democratic values in the information age. Based in Washington, D.C., their mission i ...

June 2008.
Fusion Center Update
Report from the

July 2008.
Council on Foreign Relations: Fusion Centers

"Fusion Centers", July 15, 2010
, ''Radio4All'' podcast about fusion centers and the

program
"Fusion Centers Map, Locations, Contact Information", February 15, 2011
PublicIntelligence blog's listing of centers * https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/are-we-safer/ * * {{Cite episode, title=Top Secret America, series=Frontline, network=PBS, station=WGBH, date=April 30, 2013, url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/documentary/topsecretamerica/, access-date=April 8, 2025 Counterterrorism in the United States Surveillance Public–private partnership projects in the United States