Software and cloud services provider Oracle Corp. said today it agreed to buy Cerner Corp., a provider of digital information systems for the health care provider market, in a deal valued at $28 billion. […]

Despite a proclamation over the weekend from Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.V., that he was a “no” on the existing version of Build Back Better Act legislation, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said in a Dear Colleague letter today that he plans to keep working on the reconciliation legislation until they “get something done.” […]

The Senate confirmed John Sherman to serve as the chief information officer (CIO) at the Department of Defense by voice vote on Dec. 14. […]

Digital security breaches have shown us that Federal agencies are more vulnerable than anyone thought, and their security tools are no longer effectively defending against them. This begs the question, what can IT leaders and staff at all levels do to better protect Federal networks? The short answer: it’s time to rethink our approach to basic security and how we defend every endpoint across the enterprise. […]

In November, Aaron Bishop was elevated to the position of chief information security officer (CISO) for the Department of the Air Force, taking over for Wanda Jones-Heath, who now serves as the Air Force’s principal cyber advisor. […]

When the pandemic hit, affordable and dependable internet became vital to keep the United States going. This sudden change highlighted the glaring disparity in internet connectivity to underserved communities. Congress attempted to remedy this issue with the Emergency Broadband Benefit (EBB), which offers low-income consumers a $50 discount on their internet bills. […]

State audit agencies reported unparalleled challenges faced by their workforces in providing pandemic-related unemployment insurance benefits, according to a new report released Dec. 16 by the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee (PRAC). […]

The Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) has “evolved considerably” over the past year, and as a result the team that supports the TMF Board will continue to scale up to better support modernization investments, said Raylene Yung, executive director of the TMF at the General Services Administration (GSA). […]

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued an emergency directive to Federal agencies today, requiring them to assess their internet-facing network assets for the Apache Log4j vulnerabilities and immediately patch these systems or implement other appropriate mitigation measures. […]

As dozens of Federal agencies continue to petition the TMF Board for some of the $1 billion of funding that the Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) received from Congress earlier this year, one of the Federal government’s best-positioned officials to offer advice on the process stopped by MeriTalk’s TMF Forward virtual event on Dec. 16 with a bag of tips on how agencies can hone their proposals and clinch funding deals. […]

Following its December meeting, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced that it approved a proposal seeking comment on improving transparency and efficiency in the competitive bidding process for the E-Rate program. The FCC has now released the official Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, laying out the process and deadlines for submitting comment on the E-Rate bidding process. […]

The National Security Agency (NSA) and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) published the fourth installment on securing the integrity of 5G cloud infrastructures. […]

Legislation introduced this week by the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee aims to increase the transparency of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Electronic Health Records Modernization (EHRM) program through regular reporting requirements. […]

With legacy government IT systems increasingly threatened by cyberattacks and Federal agencies on the move to improve security, the Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) is proving instrumental in helping the Education Department accelerate its transition to zero trust security architectures. […]

The Department of Defense (DoD) must address data reporting deficiencies to better prevent hazing and to improve response training. […]

Despite concerted efforts to get Democrats’ $1.75 trillion-plus Build Back Better Act passed before the end of the month, the timeline for Senate consideration of the budget reconciliation bill is effectively sliding into 2022. […]

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Deputy CIO Beth Cappello, whose agency snagged a $50 million Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) award earlier this year, this week urged Federal agency IT and financial organizations to align their expectations and resources in order to achieve better IT modernization results. […]

With two separate Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) awards already under its belt, the Department of Labor (DoL) is seeing the benefits of agency leadership’s buy-in into the funding concept as a way to make quicker headway on pressing IT modernization projects, the agency’s chief technology officer said at MeriTalk’s TMF Forward virtual event on Dec. 16. […]

The Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) confirmed today that it plans to sunset its milCloud 2.0 cloud services contract by May 2022, but offered little in the way of firm detail on how it plans to migrate to comparable services the existing customer roster of milCloud 2.0, which is managed for DISA by General Dynamics Information Technology (GDIT). […]

Data-led migrations can help forward-thinking organizations take a major step toward treating their data as a strategic asset. But, according to an official from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) for public sector entities, there are some key challenges they need to address to ensure they comply with Federal needs. […]

Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Gary Peters, D-Mich., said at Meritalk’s TMF Forward virtual event on Dec. 16 that he remains committed to pursuing further Federal IT modernization to improve citizen service capabilities, including through TMF funding. […]

The Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) is proving to be a vital source of immediate funding for pressing projects at the Office of Personnel Management’s (OPM), with CIO Guy Cavallo saying the agency would have to wait years to complete vital upgrades if it relied solely on regular appropriations. […]

With the initial big round of Technology Modernization Fund awards announced in September skewing toward cybersecurity-related projects, Federal CIO Clare Martorana said today at MeriTalk’s TMF Forward virtual event that the next round of awards will be focused more on projects that will foster citizen service improvements. […]

Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va. – one of the prime movers behind congressional approval of $1 billion of new funding for the Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) earlier this year –
emphasized the crucial impact that money will have on modernizing Federal agency networks and improving government cybersecurity and citizen service in keynote remarks at MeriTalk’s TMF Forward virtual event on Dec. 16. […]

The Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee voted Dec. 15 to approve the White House’s nomination of Alan Davidson to head the Commerce Department’s National Telecommunications and Information Association (NTIA). […]

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) said Dec. 14 that there has been no confirmed compromise of any Federal agencies as a result of the Log4j vulnerability. But CISA reiterated it has added the vulnerability to its catalog of known vulnerabilities over the weekend, giving agencies two weeks to remediate and mitigate any potential harm. […]

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) is sustaining a protest by Microsoft after the company complained that the National Security Agency (NSA) improperly evaluated proposals for cloud services in support of NSA’s classified and unclassified computing requirements when it awarded a contract to Amazon Web Services (AWS). […]

The U.S. Army plans to advance its use of digital night vision technology (DNVT) to boost its members’ situational awareness and decision-making abilities, and the branch is looking towards industry to help make it happen. […]

The Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) Dec. 14 meeting yielded a host of rulemaking actions when it comes to hot button topics for the commission, including E-Rate broadband bidding, emergency alerts, and robocalls. […]

The Senate passed the conferenced version of the fiscal year (FY) 2022 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) today, sending the $768 billion defense spending bill to President Biden’s desk for his signature. The annual defense spending bill has now been passed 61 years in a row. […]