CIA Director John Brennan announced the new directorate, which will use cyber technology to gather intelligence, in a statement addressed to the agency’s employees on Friday.
“We must place our activities and operations in the digital domain at the very center of all our mission endeavors,” Brennan said. “We will create a new Directorate that will be responsible for accelerating the integration of our digital and cyber capabilities across all of our mission areas.”
The new center will be responsible for overseeing the career development of CIA digital experts as well as the standards of digital tradecraft.
"Our ability to carry out our responsibilities for human intelligence and national security responsibilities has become more challenging,” Brennan said. "And so what we need to do as an agency is make sure we’re able to understand all of the aspects of that digital environment."
The decision to create a new department came after a Study Group obtained information from current and former officers from across the Agency, and provided a report on the CIA’s optimal preparedness.
“In conducting their research, Study Group members received input from thousands of Agency employees, reviewed best practices across the public and private sectors, and interviewed dozens of customers and current and former senior officers,” Brennan said.
Senator Richard Burr, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, praised the move by Brennan.
"This reorganization was driven not by any institutional failure, but by the realization that the world has changed over the course of the last 70 years. In many ways, the Director’s proposal is long overdue," Burr said in a statement.