Smarter Gov Tech, Stronger MerITocracy
Cybersecurity cyber

While President Biden’s 2021 cybersecurity executive order (EO) doesn’t address all of the Federal government’s cybersecurity needs, a security expert from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) said the EO’s goal drives toward prioritization of the government’s most pressing needs – rather than a fix-all approach. […]

The National Security Agency (NSA) has released a cybersecurity technical report for its Network Infrastructure Security Guidance that features network infrastructure best practices, according to a March 1 release from the agency. […]

military healthcare, veterans healthcare

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is looking to modernize physician training with a new virtual reality technology that can be brought to scale and utilized as a “one size fits all” solution through a request for information (RFI). […]

Department of Commerce

The Department of Commerce has appointed Oliver Wise as chief data officer (CDO). Wise will join the Department on March 14 according to a post on his Twitter page. […]

Several senators asked the Treasury Department this week for an update on the agency’s ability to enforce cryptocurrency sanctions against Russia and others in light of concerns that Russia will increase its use of cryptocurrency in the face of a wide-ranging financial sanctions in response to its invasion of Ukraine. […]

workforce federal workers industry-min

The Senate this week voted to approve two nominees to the three-member Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) – giving the board its first quorum in five years so that it can begin to take action on a big backlog of cases. […]

What Happened This Week – Ep. 53

President Biden in his March 1 State of the Union pleaded with members of Congress to complete work on reconciling two bills that would fund the CHIPS Act to support domestic semiconductor manufacturing, provide funding to the National Science Foundation (NSF) for a new technology directorate, and direct billions of new money to improve supply chain resiliency. […]

Joe Biden
Army DoD military Defense AI

The General Services Administration (GSA) is working with the Office of Management and Budget’s (OMB) Office of the Federal CIO to finalize the launch date of its modernized Federal IT Dashboard, which is now being targeted for a mid-March debut. […]

The Space Development Agency (SDA) has awarded a trio of contractors a total of $1.8 billion of contracts to build a mesh network of interconnected space satellites that will form the basis of a high-volume data communications system expected to make up the “backbone” of its Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2) network, SDA said in a release. […]

NIST

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is developing a Cybersecurity Practice Guide through its National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence (NCCoE) and Communications Technology Laboratory (CTL) and are requesting comment to refine the project’s scope. […]

Women

Even while women continue to make significant gains in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields, many are still encountering obstacles in their career trajectories. Several women leaders in Federal government STEM fields offered advice from their own experiences at a March 1 virtual event hosted by ATARC on how to overcome challenges they have faced. […]

The Senate on March 1 approved by unanimous consent the Strengthening American Cybersecurity Act of 2022. The bill is a sweeping legislative package introduced last month that aims to update the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA), codify the General Services Administration’s Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP), and require timely cyber incident reporting by critical infrastructure providers. […]

cellphone
President Biden
research
electric grid

As the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) is shifting its focus from protecting sets of critical assets to improving the resilience of critical functions, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said the agency should improve its priority setting, stakeholder involvement, and threat information sharing in connection with that effort. […]

federal workforce worker hired-min

The General Services Administration (GSA) has named its 2022 cohort of Presidential Innovation Fellows (PIF), who will serve one-year stints at 14 Federal agencies to support the Biden-Harris administration’s focus on empowering the Federal workforce and delivering an effective and efficient government. […]

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) is busy deciphering how to best distribute $48 billion of new broadband funding from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021, which the head of the NTIA said is a “once in a generation opportunity” to close the digital divide. […]

speed
Blockchain link

The Department of Justice (DoJ) announced that the founder of an alleged fraudulent cryptocurrency trading platform, which at one time had a peak market of $3.4 billion, has been indicted by a San Diego Federal grand jury, according to a Feb. 25 release. […]

Air Force

The U.S. Air Force (USAF) has been deploying a modernized financial system since 2005, but the service branch has yet to create a migration plan to guide transition from the legacy system to the more modern one, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said in a new report. […]

The United States and its allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) need to be prepared to face a high-level cyber assault from the Russian government, warned Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., on Feb. 28 during a Washington Post virtual event. […]

NASA

Pointing to harms that can result from the use of online data from children and teens, Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass. – an architect of early internet privacy laws – is continuing his years-long push for an update to data privacy laws to more comprehensively protect children in today’s digital landscape, and expand provisions of the law to protect all adults if possible. […]

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