Last year brought a great deal of change to Washington, D.C., from a new administration moving into the White House to D.C. United building a new stadium. As 2018 starts up with seemingly limitless IT opportunities ahead, MeriTalk takes a look back on the top Federal IT stories from 2017. […]
When Joby Emmons arrived for his first day as general counsel at IdeaScale, he was told: “Your first job at IdeaScale is to get us FedRAMP authorized.” […]
The MGT Act became the law of the land on Dec. 21, when President Trump signed it into law as part of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). This is the much-vaunted revolving capital fund–cut out of the original FITARA bill in committee–that establishes a central bucket of money at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), managed by the General Services Administration (GSA), for Feds to modernize legacy IT systems. […]
What does everybody in Federal IT want for Christmas? Yes, you guessed it, a new Federal CIO. Santa’s elves have been chattering, and we understand that Suzette Kent will soon be named to the top job in Federal IT. With the passage of the MGT Act and FITARA grades slip sliding, folks have been calling for a new executive to get to grips with the change agenda. […]
Last July, the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) revamped the provisional authorization process to make life easier for cloud service providers (CSPs). The change let CSPs use a simple web form to delineate their business cases to FedRAMP’s Joint Authorization Board (JAB). […]
In a report released on Dec. 7, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) reported that while Veterans Affairs (VA) has made some progress on key IT initiatives under Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA) requirements, it has nonetheless fallen short of Office of Management and Budget (OMB) targets regarding consolidating and optimizing its data centers. […]
SAP’s National Security Services (NS2), a U.S. subsidiary of the international software company, has secured a FedRAMP JAB authorization for its cloud-based human capital management (HCM) suite. SAP NS2’s SuccessFactors HCM suite offers a variety of products, including talent acquisition and management tools, analytics tools, and core human resource tools, all running on the Amazon Web Services’ (AWS) GovCloud platform. […]
The Federal CIO Council recently released a case study focusing on Technology Business Management (TBM) adoption rates at a single bureau within the Department of Justice (DOJ). The study will be used as part of the council’s commitment to guide agency-wide adoption of TBM. […]
The FBI currently has a backlog of nearly 7,000 crime-connected phones that its experts are unable to crack. And it’s going to get much worse, law enforcement leaders say. […]
As Federal agencies struggle to meet Office of Management and Budget’s data center optimization targets, the General Services Administration has stepped up its efforts to support agencies as they work to consolidate, migrate and close data centers. […]
The GSA is concerned that current cloud procurement methods are leading to confusion and a lack compliance with FedRAMP requirements. To curb the contract discrepancies, the GSA released a new RFI seeking industry input to “identify examples of preferred contract language agencies should incorporate to convey FedRAMP requirements in their solicitations,” according to a FedRAMP blog. […]
Yesterday’s release of the FITARA Scorecard 5.0 did not look promising for Federal agencies. In today’s Oversight and Government Reform IT Subcommittee FITARA hearing, the committee shared their concerns and sought answers from agency officials testifying. […]
As Federal CIOs brace for tomorrow’s Oversight and Government Reform IT Subcommittee FITARA hearing, it’s not great news on the fifth FITARA report card. […]
The Inspector General of the Small Business Administration (SBA) found that the agency’s IT leadership needs to address the Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA) and cybersecurity threats. […]
The White House Office of Management and Budget issued a memorandum for agencies to submit their Federal Information Security Modernization Act reports to the Government Accountability Office by March 1, 2018. […]
The new administration has left little doubt that consolidation is a top priority. The first budget calls for deep cuts across most agencies. If achieved, these reductions are likely to put the squeeze on already stressed IT budgets. The search for creative solutions can and must intensify. The U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is pursuing a hybrid cloud model that will simultaneously address optimization, security and budget priorities—blazing a trail for other Federal agencies to follow. […]
As the deadline to renew the National Security Agency’s surveillance powers looms, proposed bills and speculations of bills drive the conversation on national security versus privacy. Senate Republicans led by Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., proposed a bill in June to completely renew Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act without any changes or sunset provision. Section 702, which expires at the end of the year, allows the NSA to collect data from foreign nationals without obtaining a warrant. […]
The Supreme Court announced Oct. 16 that it will hear a case on data privacy that relates to Microsoft’s data centers in Ireland. The Department of Justice filed a petition last year requesting an en banc rehearing of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals case, which sided in favor of Microsoft that American service providers are not required to honor warrants seeking data outside the United States. […]
The FBI needs access to encrypted files in order to protect the nation against cyber crime, according to Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. “Encryption is essential,” Rosenstein said “It is a foundational element of data security and authentication. It is central to the growth and flourishing of the digital economy. We in law enforcement have no desire to undermine encryption. But ‘warrant-proof’ encryption poses a serious problem.” […]
The U.S. Government Publishing Office named Tracee Boxley its new chief information officer on Oct 5. Boxley served as acting CIO since November 2016, where she led the IT department’s modernization of technology infrastructure, completed the migration of several legacy systems, and strengthened cybersecurity technology. […]
A bipartisan group of senators proposed legislation to extend certain provisions in the Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act. The extension would add two years to agencies’ data center consolidation efforts. The bill is the same as the FITARA Extension amendment that was adopted by the House of Representatives in July. […]
The General Services Administration announced Sept. 28 the launch of the FedRAMP Tailored Baseline for Cloud Service Providers with Low-Impact Software-as-a-Service Systems. […]
Rep. Will Hurd, R-Texas, said that he plans to track the IT modernization working capital fund, which will come from his Modernization Government Technology Act, on the FITARA scorecard. […]
Government doesn’t take the dangers of metadata security seriously enough, members of industry said at an Institute for Critical Infrastructure event on Sept. 26. They cited the passage of SJ 34, which reduced regulations on Internet service providers’ use of metadata generated by their customers. […]
In order to get more government agencies to transition to the cloud, agency experts said that the procurement process has to become easier and clearer. […]
The CIO Council is hosting a governmentwide cybersecurity hiring event Nov. 6-7. The Federal government is seeking information technology and cybersecurity professionals to fill hundreds of positions needed to modernize legacy IT and strengthen the cybersecurity of Federal networks and critical infrastructure. […]
The Government Accountability Office found that of the 24 agencies required to participate in the Data Center Optimization Initiative, 22 said they were making limited progress toward the 2018 performance targets. […]
The American Civil Liberties Union described full adoption of artificial intelligence at any cost as a “recipe for tyranny.” Ben Wizner, director of the ACLU Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, wrote in a blog post that the government needs to consider the rights of citizens as artificial intelligence becomes more ingrained in society. “Liberty is […]
The Government Accountability Office found that the National Highway and Traffic Safety Administration needs to clarify its policies for ensuring the privacy of drivers of connected vehicles. Thirteen of the 16 selected automakers in GAO’s study sell connected vehicles, and those 13 reported collecting, using, and sharing data on the cars’ locations and operations. […]
President Donald Trump nominated John Sherman, to be chief information officer of the Intelligence Community under the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, on Aug. 18. […]