The Federal Trade Commission has issued a warning about a new scam that targets men by claiming to know a personal secret about them and demanding a ransom in bitcoin. […]
Brian Sadler, senior scientist for intelligent systems at the U.S. Army Research Laboratory, today discussed how the expanse of artificial intelligence (AI) research activities across the Army is bringing to light even greater challenges. […]
The Federal government’s “Cloud First” strategy didn’t get quite the results the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) was looking for the first time, so now OMB is about to unveil “Cloud Smart,” which updates the seven-year-old strategy with an eye toward energizing agencies that have lagged in making the transition. […]
Wireless communications industry trade group CTIA said this week it launched its cybersecurity certification program for cellular-connected Internet of Things (IoT) devices. […]
With just 75 days to go until the 2018 midterm elections and amid mounting pressure for legislative action to boost election security, the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration postponed today’s scheduled business meeting on the Secure Elections Act, which would help state and local governments apply for Federal grants to modernize their election systems and receive relevant cyber threat information. […]
La’Naia Jones, Deputy CIO of the Intelligence Community, said today that the commoditization of hacking capabilities, expansion of IT supply chain exploits, and nation-state use of ransomware have come to the attention of the IC as primary areas of interest in the fight for better cybersecurity. […]
The Election Assistance Commission on Tuesday released most state budget data for Help America Vote Act (HAVA) grants, which revealed that a majority of the $380 million in grant money is being devoted to cybersecurity and new voting equipment. […]
Kelly Olson, chief of staff for the General Services Administration’s (GSA) Technology and Transformation Services (TTS) organization, will take over as acting director of TTS and Deputy Commissioner of GSA’s Federal Acquisition Service (FAS) beginning Monday, August 27. […]
The Department of Homeland Security is working with multiple Federal agencies to develop a new “risk radar” that will help agencies’ top executives contextualize cybersecurity risk and clarify where they need to apply focus and resources, according to Mark Kneidinger, director of the Federal Network Resilience division of DHS’ Office of Cybersecurity and Communications (CS&C). […]
The Federal Aviation Administration has issued a request for information (RFI) for moving its FAA Enterprise Network Services program (FENS) to Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA) High standards. […]
Members of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee quizzed the Trump administration’s nominee to head the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) about agency reorganization, cybersecurity, and acquisition issues during a generally supportive nomination hearing today. […]
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has awarded $4 million to support small business innovation through NIST’s Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program. […]
During a Senate Energy Committee hearing on blockchain Tuesday, senators and experts discussed the potential for blockchain to create a distributed, resilient, and secure power grid. […]
Thomas Fanning, chief executive officer of Atlanta-based electric utility holding company Southern Co. and a key player in developing private-sector cybersecurity policy, said today at a Senate subcommittee hearing that he has begun to have interactions with senior Federal government military leaders about capabilities to “hack back” at cyber attackers, but emphasized he believes that those types of retaliatory capabilities need to remain in the hands of the military rather than become a corporate function. […]
The Army could soon be leveraging more autonomous vehicle capabilities and commercial communications solutions to bring it closer to a goal of persistent communications, persistent intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR), and faster decision speed. […]
Microsoft Corp. said late Monday that its Digital Crimes Unit seized – with the approval of a special master appointed by a federal court – six internet domains created by Strontium, a hacker organization associated with the Russian government. […]
The State Department has issued a request for information for systems that collect relevant online information to “analyze and track global developments in (near) real-time.” […]
Booz Allen Hamilton confirmed today its selection as prime contractor under the Federal government-wide Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation (CDM) Dynamic and Evolving Federal Enterprise Network Defense (DEFEND) program for Group D Federal agencies. […]
Beth Killoran, CIO of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) since November 2015, has left the position for a new role at the Office of the Surgeon General, and CTO Ed Simcox has been named acting CIO, an HHS official confirmed to MeriTalk. […]
Charles Phalen, director of the National Background Investigations Bureau (NBIB), said Sunday in an appearance on Government Matters that his organization has been working with the Defense Department since December 2017 to shift the entirety of its operations over to DoD, long ahead of a coming executive order from President Trump that will make the move official. […]
The First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet), a Federal government entity within the Department of Commerce that is working with AT&T to build out a nationwide broadband communications network for first responders, said today that Sue Swenson is stepping down as chair of the FirstNet board, and Jeffrey Johnson is resigning as vice chair. […]
Research firm Gartner has released its 2018 Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies report, which found technologies like artificial intelligence platform as a service, blockchain for data security, and quantum computing reaching the peak of inflated expectations, while technologies such as mixed reality, and blockchain were on the downswing of excitement. […]
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science & Technology Directorate (S&T) announced today that it awarded DataRobot $200,000 to begin testing a prototype of a machine learning platform for the U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s Global Travel Assessment System. […]
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) said today that an internal IT systems failure–that has shut down its major electronic database for patent-related activities since last Wednesday–has yet to be remedied, and that teams are working to restore service following an ongoing five-day outage. […]
Federal agencies are looking to gain actionable intelligence and information from disparate data sources in a secure, scalable, and efficient manner. An emerging technology known as a big data fabric could provide those agencies with a unified platform “that accelerates insights by automating ingestion, curation, discovery, preparation, and integration from data silos,” according to Forrester Research. […]
General Paul Nakasone, head of the National Security Agency (NSA) and U.S. Cyber Command (CyberCom), recommended keeping the agencies under the same leader for the next two years, according to a report by the Washington Post […]
We’re sitting at a critical inflection point in Federal IT. Cloud wars are raging, AI’s bubbling, and IoT’s, well, almost literally, everywhere. And, as in any conflict, the first casualty is all too often the truth. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is looking to significantly overhaul its online presence, and on Wednesday opened bidding on a contract to develop a content management system for VA.gov–the agency’s primary website. […]
A collection of tech-sector trade groups including the Internet Association and Digital Europe is urging leaders from the world’s top 20 economic powers to focus on policies that encourage broadband deployment and adoption, and job skills training for the digital workforce when the G20’s Digital Economy Task Force meets next week in Argentina. […]
The Department of Homeland Security today released a request for information (RFI) calling on the private sector to provide DHS with information on strategies and tools to augment its cyber supply chain risk management program. […]