Accelerating the pace of change by bringing in motivated innovators and new ideas from startups and small businesses can be an effective way of driving real innovation across the Federal government, Deputy Federal CIO Maria Roat said today at the ACT-IAC ReImagine ELC 2020 virtual event. […]

A group of 31 House Democrats led by leadership of the House Oversight and Reform Committee asked the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) in an October 28 letter to cease work on implementing President Trump’s executive order that would create a new “Schedule F” classification for policy-involved Federal employees, and make it easier to hire and fire them. […]

Cyber

John Sherman, Principal Deputy CIO at the Department of Defense (DoD), said Oct. 28 that the Pentagon is making progress with IT modernization activities for the parts of the agency known as “the Fourth Estate” – offices that are not military services or intelligence community agencies. […]

DoD Pentagon Military

The Defense Department’s (DoD) current interim rule for the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) will take full effect on December 1, said Katie Arrington, CISO for DoD’s acquisition office, at an October 28 virtual event organized by C4ISRNET. […]

The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Inspector General’s Office (OIG) is giving credit to the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s (CISA) efforts to improve election security nationwide, but said in a new report that CISA still has a lot of work to do on that front, particularly in areas involving physical security of election infrastructure. […]

Washington DC capitol federal government-min

Senior House Democrats have introduced legislation to reverse President Trump’s controversial executive order that would create a new “Schedule F” classification for Federal employees in  policy-making positions and make it easier to hire and fire them. […]

Innovation
quantum computing AI min

While the science underlying the still-nascent field of quantum information science (QIS) is well established, timelines for other key milestones in the development of QIS remain big question marks – with none bigger than the development of a QIS tech workforce that can meet increased demand for the technology in the coming years. […]

5G Broadband rural broadband FCC-min

The Federal Communications Commission on Oct. 27 voted to approve action to “reduce regulatory barriers to 5G deployment by further streamlining the state and local government review process for modifications to existing wireless infrastructure that involve excavation and deployment beyond existing site boundaries.” […]

AI
cybersecurity

The surging use of collaboration tools like Microsoft Teams and Zoom during the pandemic has dramatically increased the information attack surface for organizations and widened blind spots in data protection. MeriTalk recently connected with Matthew Radolec, Director of Security Architecture & Incident Response at Varonis, to understand how organizations can effectively detect and respond to cyber threats popping up in tools many haven’t thought to consider. […]

Pentagon Military Defense DoD

Defense Department (DoD) Deputy Chief Data Officer James Cully today emphasized the importance of keeping an open mind about how to work greater data capabilities into technology solutions as the Pentagon moves forward to execute on its data strategy released earlier this month. […]

Kids at computers hackers students education
cloud
Innovation

The global cost of cybercrime continues to rise during the COVID-19 pandemic, millions of people’s personal data is potentially exposed, and our government and infrastructure are actively being targeted. Not only do ongoing issues such as noisy data play a role in the problem, but so does human motivation, specifically its impact on behavior. […]

National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA)

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) explained in an Oct. 23 memo to Federal agency heads how it wants them to implement President Trump’s controversial executive order that creates a new Schedule F classification for employees in policy-making positions, but emphasized that OPM retains the final say in approving which employees are placed under the new schedule. […]

capitol washington dc senate house congress-min

A group of Democratic senators wrote to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Inspector General (IG) to request that the IG investigate alleged warrantless domestic surveillance of phones by DHS’s Customs and Border Protection (CBP) component. […]

Gerry Connolly

Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., whose northern Virginia congressional district is home to a multitude of Federal government employees, is working on legislation that would aim to overturn last week’s controversial White House executive order that would create a new classification of Federal employees in policy-making positions and make it easier to hire and fire them. […]

telework

Reps. Jerry McNerney, D-Calif., and Pete Olson, R-Texas – both co-chairs of the Congressional Artificial Intelligence Caucus – on Oct. 23 stumped for the AI in Government Act of 2020 (H.R. 2575) that passed the House last month and now sits on Senate general legislative calendar awaiting possible action. […]

Federal officials this week discussed how they can support new approaches like zero trust and SD-WAN in an efficient and secure way by leveraging the Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS) contract along with security requirements of the Trusted Internet Connections (TIC) 3.0 policy. […]

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