The U.S. is going to launch a new terror alert system

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security will soon launch a new national terror threat alert system, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said Monday.

The National Threat Advisory System, started in 2011 to replace a color-coded warning system, has never been used, NPR reports. The new system, Johnson told the crowd at a moderated Defense One discussion, would have a lower threshold than NTAS for alerting the public to threats.

"I believe that we need to do a better job of informing the public at large of what we are seeing, removing some of the mystery about the global terrorism threat and what we are doing about it and what we are asking the public to do," Johnson said.