Members of the Cyberspace Solarium Commission are asking the chair and ranking member of the House Appropriations Committee to increase funding for the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) by at least $400 million, with some of that funding intended to make sure that CISA’s Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation (CDM) program can quickly deploy security tools. […]

The General Services Administration (GSA) is looking to serve as a “proving ground” for cloud adoption in the Federal government, to lead the way in digital transformation and to serve as a model for other agencies, GSA CIO David Shive said today. […]

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) announced that .gov top-level domains will be available at no cost for qualifying organizations beginning immediately – a move that should help on the cybersecurity front especially for smaller governmental entities.   […]

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee today approved the nomination of Kiran Ahuja to become the next director of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). […]

The United States Coast Guard (CG) intends to work with one or more companies to help improve communications between Coast Guard Cutter tactical commanders and boarding teams, according to a notice of intent posted to the Federal registry April 27. […]

President Biden’s American Families Plan announced today proposes providing two years of subsidized tuition and expansion of programs in high-demand fields— such as science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM)— at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs) and other minority-serving institutions (MSIs). […]

President Biden intends to nominate Heidi Shyu, a former assistant secretary of the Army, to serve as the under secretary for research and engineering at the Department of Defense (DoD), the White House announced Wednesday. […]

With development and adoption of AI increasing over the past year, Federal and private sector experts say the time for Federal agencies to invest in the technology – and to develop the deep knowledge to explain to the public how it works – is right now. […]

The General Services Administration’s FedRAMP program announced that it extended the deadline for its Connect Business Cases to May 21, 2021. […]

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) issued a request for information (RFI) seeking a cloud-based online meeting, event, and training platform. […]

UniversIT, MeriTalk’s online library of training courses offering 20-minute complimentary education opportunities to IT pros across the spectrum, opens the doors to its newest course, Dive into Data Lakes: Centralized Data Enables Mission Success. […]

The sustained use of legacy IT systems in the Federal government presents a variety of challenges, including missed opportunities and a need for the modernization of agency cultures, Fed IT experts told Senate members today. […]

Federal employees were more engaged and satisfied with their jobs in 2020, despite the COVID-19 pandemic forcing Federal agencies to shift to majority telework, the Office of Personnel Management’s (OPM) 2020 OPM Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey (OPM FEVS) shows. […]

In light of recent supply chain intrusions, the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA) and National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) have released new guidance on defending supply chain software, using the NIST framework to identify and mitigate risks. […]

Sens. Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., and Ben Sasse, R-Neb., have introduced the National Risk Management Act, which would ensure that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is properly identifying and addressing risks to the nation’s critical infrastructure (CI). […]

Sens. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and Gary Peters, D-Mich., introduced the Cyber Response and Recovery Act, which would authorize $20 million of spending to support Federal and non-Federal entities impacted by major cyber events, according to an April 23 press release. […]

The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) issued a request for information (RFI) for a cloud-based case management tracking system (CMTS). […]

Senior Federal IT experts – including the current and former Federal CISO and the Pentagon’s top IT official – are expressing broad agreement that the necessary ingredients are at hand to begin implementing zero trust security concepts for government networks, and that the time to act is now. […]

While a clear majority of stakeholders in the Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation (CDM) program believe that CDM is more important than ever in defending against cyber breaches, only a small fraction praise CDM for its ability to build civilian government network resilience following a breach. […]

President Biden is signing an executive order (EO) today that will establish a task force for worker organizing and facilitate organizing across the country through an all-of-government approach to mobilizing Federal policies, programs, and practices. […]

In a recent Government Accountability Office (GAO) report, GAO’s Chris Currie, director of the Homeland Security and Justice team, flagged longstanding management and operational issues within the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Inspector General (OIG) that has led to “frequent leadership turnover” and “organizational weaknesses.” […]

President Biden appointed Amit Mital, a cybersecurity industry veteran, to the National Security Council (NSC) as the senior director for cybersecurity strategy and policy, Mital’s LinkedIn confirms. Mital will also serve in the White House as a special assistant to the president. […]

The Department of Commerce’s Business Application Solutions (BAS) program – which aims to modernize the agency’s legacy financial systems – needs to develop a business practice reengineering plan and align its change effort processes with best practices, the agency’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) said in a management alert. […]

The National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) found that Federal employees overwhelmingly support continued telework after the pandemic, and believe that their productivity has increased while teleworking over the past 14 months.  […]

Over the past year, the country has seen surges in civil unrest, protests, and riots – culminating in the January 6 attacks on the U.S. Capitol. These domestic threats are increasing in intensity and frequency, and emphasize the importance of protecting both Federal and state government employees and facilities. […]

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has issued the seventh update in its quest for a cloud-based Common Enterprise Loan Origination and Servicing (CELOS) platform. […]

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s (CISA) National Risk Management Center (NRMC) has been busy assessing and identifying security risks for 5G wireless services, which present newfound risks unique to the technology, an NRMC official said April 22. […]

The United States Army Futures Command’s Command, Control, Computers, Communications, Cyber Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (C5ISR) has selected Booz Allen Hamilton to build a data fabric key to the Department of Defense’s (DoD) Joint All Domain Command and Control (JADC2) concept, the firm announced April 20. […]

Reps. Eddie Bernice Johnson, D-Texas., and Frank Lucas, R-Okla., introduced the Combating Sexual Harassment in Science Act, which would expand research efforts to better understand the causes and consequences of sexual harassment in the science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) workforce. […]

Republicans in Congress on April 22 presented their own version of a framework to improve infrastructure in the United States. While it doesn’t look too much like President Biden’s much larger American Jobs Plan infrastructure proposal, for tech-related issues the key overlap appears to be funding for broadband infrastructure expansion. […]