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April 2017 • The PCB Magazine 89 EXECUTIVE AGENT FOR PCB AND ELECTRONIC INTERCONNECT TECHNOLOGY PRCB TRUST ACCREDITATION cuits, FPGAs, PrCBs) when they are identifiable (to the supplier) as having a DoD end-use" [3] . In response to congressional and DoD directives, the PrCB EA proposed pursuing a trust accredi- tation program for PrCB suppliers. A standard trust accreditation process for DoD PrCB suppliers will result in cost savings for both industry and DoD by leveraging pre- compliance with industry standards, eliminat- ing redundant audit functions, and increas- ing competition for DoD work. Recent market growth in the PrCB industry has been accompa- nied by globalization of production capabilities along with a declining domestic industrial base and DoD market share. Even when a U.S. based firm accepts an order, it is typical for all or some of the production to take place in a foreign facil- ity. This environment has an increasingly lim- ited view into suppliers' quality processes and access controls. There is an unquantified risk to the reliability, safety, and security of the PrCB related products and services being delivered for national security systems. To mitigate risk, each prime or government program currently conducts independent audit functions on their supply base. This is highly redundant, as board shops with multiple DoD customers may be subject to multiple indepen- dent audits with the associated overhead costs. This also limits healthy competition, as the bar- rier to entry is higher for manufacturers that fo- cus on commercial products and do not want to incur the audit-driven costs associated with winning DoD work. The PrCB Trust Accredi- tation standardizes requirements for working with the DoD, thus eliminating the necessity for program-specific audits. It also promotes competition by recognizing the value of both military and commercial accreditations in qual- ity and security to lower the barrier to entry for nontraditional DoD suppliers. With technology progression and increased reliance of military systems on electronics, in- formation security has acquired a new level of importance. There is a need for a trust accredi- tation process to ensure that board shops deliv- ering DoD products have taken adequate steps to protect DoD proprietary information and prevent unauthorized access. As new technolo- gies emerge, the lines between software, firm- ware, and hardware will continue to blur. On the hardware side, integrated circuits and PrCB technologies continue to progress, and the dis- tinctions between the two industrial bases have become less pronounced with 3D packaging of integrated circuits and the embedding of active components into PrCBs. In this atmosphere of rapid advancement, it is critical that the DoD has an industrial presence to maintain aware- ness of domestic capability and evaluate the se- curity risk posed by modern technologies and industrial base globalization. Products and ser- vices obtained from trusted suppliers must meet known standards for quality, CoC, and security. The return on investment for the additional up- front costs of procuring premium products and services from a trusted supplier comes in the form of increased system-level reliability, safety, and security. PCB References 1. Department of Defense, "DoD Instruction 5000.02 Operation of the Defense Acquisition System," 7 January 2015. 2. Department of Defense, "DoD Instruction 5200.39 Critical Program Information Identifi- cation and Protection Within Research, Devel- opment, Test, and Evaluation," 28 May 2015. 3. Department of Defense, "DoD Instruc- tion 5200.44 Protection of Mission Critical Functions to Achieve Trusted Systems and Net- works," November 5, 2012. 4. Department of Defense, "Performance Specifciation MIL-PRF-31032 Printed Circuit Board/Printed Wiring Board, General Specifica- tion for," May 16 2016. " There is an unquantified risk to the reliability, safety, and security of the PrCB related products and services being delivered for national security systems. "