The Department of Veterans Affairs suspended the use of the Yammer social sharing platform after a scathing Inspector General report found mass violations of VA security policy that may have put veterans’ personal information at risk. In an email sent to all VA employees Thursday, VA officials said use of Yammer has been susepended effecitive […]

When it comes to mobile apps, don’t bite off more than your users can chew, say new findings gathered from the Federal CrowdSource Mobile Testing Program, a free service provided to Federal agencies by the General Services Administration (GSA). The program has been available since 2013 and has tested 14 agencies so far, with about […]

A group of cybersecurity and computer science experts backed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency began a long-term encryption research effort last month that could one day prevent hackers from being able to reverse engineer and steal software. The goal of DARPA’s Safeware program is to develop technology that can cryptographically obscure software code, […]

Hewlett Packard Inc. last year announced it will split in two, with Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) taking on the enterprise IT business. That will include Helion, the company’s cloud computing products and services. TBR Inc. analyst Cassandra Mooshian said the split will help HPE’s cloud business, making it “even better positioned to execute on its […]

The National Security Agency detailed “a significant amount of people and resources” to the Federal investigation of the data breach at the Office of Personnel Management, NSA Director Admiral Michael Rogers acknowledged Tuesday at a public forum in Washington, D.C. The response, however, was largely an effort to help OPM understand how the breach happened […]

The National Counterintelligence and Security Center — an arm of the intelligence community responsible for developing strategies to counter foreign espionage targeting Federal agencies and major government contractors — has started a comprehensive training and education initiative focused on cyber espionage, particularly spear phishing. The initiative, which also includes a broader awareness component focusing on […]

Three prominent senators are urging the agencies in charge of allocating wireless communications spectrum to come up with a plan to share the valuable commodity in the 5.9 GHz band, a part of the spectrum sought by the auto industry to provide better safety on the highways. “The demand for spectrum resources continues to expand, […]

Forty-five percent of Federal agencies reported that they were the target during the past year of a digital insider — an employee with authorized network access who knowingly steals or unwittingly exposes sensitive data. And at least a third of those agencies reported suffering an actual loss of data, according to a new survey by […]

The massive, governmentwide efforts to consolidate data centers and squeeze more efficiency, cost savings and security out of cloud computing are not without their challenges. Both require new ways of thinking and a willingness to embrace change — two things that can be very difficult for entrenched bureaucracies that are uneasy with the perceived loss […]

Federal agencies saved $3.6 billion from Fiscal 2011 to 2014 as a result of the Office of Management and Budget’s (OMB) IT reform initiatives, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO). Four of the 24 agencies that participated in the IT reform initiative – the departments of Defense, Homeland Security, and […]

Telehealth virtual consultations are expected to grow by more than 10 million over the next five years, according to research firm IHS, which projects these consultations to go from 16.6 million this year to 26.9 million by 2020. According to Nancy Green, global practice lead for healthcare strategy and thought leadership at Verizon Enterprise Solutions, […]

Federal agencies that want to move to the cloud should plan their migration carefully, said Maria Roat, chief technology officer at the Department of Transportation. “There’s a lot of moving parts and pieces (when it comes) to moving to the cloud,” Roat said on a MeriTalk webinar, “How Much Does the Federal Cloud Cost?” To […]

Congress on Friday delved yet again into the operational and organizational challenges that continue to hobble the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the massive organization created nearly 13 years ago when 22 separate agencies were cobbled together. The House Homeland Security Committee’s subcommittee on Oversight and Management Efficiencyweighed whether DHS can fix management and other […]

State healthcare marketplaces, created under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), have made improvements over the past year, but problems still exist, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO). Healthcare.Gov, the Federal healthcare marketplace, has been plagued by problems since it went live in 2013, submitting the Federal government […]

There are two things that Defense Department Chief Information Officer Terry Halvorsen wants to change: The pace at which the Defense Department adopts cloud computing and the level of automation in today’s cyber defenses. Both are easier said than done, but not impossible. And Halvorsen is optimistic that the Pentagon can begin making real progress […]

MeriTalk hosted its fourth annual Cyber Security Brainstorm Wednesday and packed the conference center at the Newseum in Washington, D.C., with government and industry cyber security experts who braved gridlock-inducing security restrictions put in place during the Pope’s visit so that they could share the latest best practices in cyber intelligence, combating the insider threat […]

Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas) on Tuesday urged Federal agencies to stop wasting money on legacy computer systems and move more quickly with cloud computing initiatives. “Legacy systems are expensive to operate and often make sensitive information vulnerable to cyber attacks,” Hurd said at the House Oversight Committee’s subcommittee on Information Technology field hearing at the […]

Preventing cyber attacks requires focusing on adversaries rather than the technology used to stop those adversaries, the retired deputy director of the National Security Agency (NSA) said Wednesday at MeriTalk’s Fourth Annual Cyber Security Brainstorm. “It’s about more than technology,” said Chris Inglis, who retired from the NSA last year and now teaches at the […]

The Father of the Internet sees the potential of the Internet of Things. But there are also risks associated with having billions of connected devices, Vint Cerf said at the Fourth Annual Cyber Security Brainstorm. “The headline I worry about is ‘100,000 Refrigerators Attack Bank of America,’” said Cerf, who helped develop the TCP/IP protocols […]

Greg Godbout, the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) at the EPA since April, is bringing a new way of thinking to the Federal IT community. His goal is to create a more agile system and improve everyday processes, serving the customers, not the stakeholders. Formerly the Executive Director and Co-Founder of 18F at the General Services […]

The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) issued its latest version of a Health IT Strategic Plan last week, expanding it significantly over the plan released last year. This year’s plan, which covers goals to be accomplished between 2015 and 2020, is a result of ONC’s collaboration with 35 Federal partners, […]

Insiders remain a significant threat to Federal agencies. A recent report, “Inside Job: The Federal Insider Threat Report,” illustrates the ongoing danger Federal agencies face from insider threats and the work agencies need to do to protect data. In the past year, 45 percent of Federal IT managers say their agency has been a target […]

The world is a big place and we can learn a lot by studying how different governments and business cultures approach the pressing technology challenges of the day. David Bray recently had a chance to do just that. As a 2015 Eisenhow Fellow, Bray spent 5 weeks visiting with senior government and industry leaders in […]

Despite the growing threat and success of cyberattacks on government and commercial sites, the information community around the world is failing to recruit talented women with the expertise to create a tougher information security wall, a new report says. The 2015 global report, “Women in Security: Wisely Positioned for the Future of InfoSec,” by (ISC)² […]

Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas) last week urged Federal agencies to stop wasting money on legacy computer systems and move more quickly with cloud computing initiatives. “Legacy systems are expensive to operate and often make sensitive information vulnerable to cyber attacks,” Hurd said at the House Oversight Committee’s subcommittee on Information Technology field hearing at the […]

Cloud Service Provider (CSP) Esri last week earned a rare distinction – its Managed Cloud Services became the first system to transition from a CSP supplied package to an agency FedRAMP authorization. Esri, based in Redlands, California, initially earned its Authority to Operate (ATO) at the moderate level from the U.S. Census Bureau. Esri provides […]

A new report from the General Accountability Office (GAO) is at the center of the increasingly heated debate over the Medicare and Medicaid electronic health record (EHR) incentive program. The current debate stems around the pace at which Stage 3 of the meaningful use incentive requirements should be issued and the difficulties in achieving interoperability. […]

The CIA’s new Digital Innovation Directorate — the first new directorate established by the agency in more than 50 years — began official operations Thursday, marking what the agency is characterizing as a major milestone in the comprehensive modernization effort announced in March. The new so-called DDI is tasked with accelerating the integration of advanced […]

A new global survey by Deloitte Digital aims to understand what factors contribute to digital transformation success in government and the barriers that lead to some agencies becoming digital laggards. In a 44-page study based on the survey and more than 140 interviews with public sector officials from more than 70 countries, Deloitte authors William […]

Since client server and traditional web enabled IT architectures became popular in large enterprises in the mid 90s, organizations developed the practice of building enterprise applications layer upon layer, acquiring dedicated pools of hardware, middleware, software and applications, based on a previously defined set of requirements. This practice is still in vogue within many government […]