Establishing a data-driven government, Federal officials suggested today, requires recognizing data management as a team sport, putting change “champions” into positions of responsibility, and educating the workforce to realize the value of the day they are collecting. […]
A July 21 report from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Office of the Inspector General (OIG) prioritizes enhancing IT to combat cyberthreats as one of EPA’s top Fiscal Year 2020-2021 management challenges. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) announced July 20 that CIO James Gfrerer swore in Todd Simpson as deputy assistant secretary for DevSecOps. […]
As the General Services Administration’s 18F stepped up to help agencies with the quick technical shift to telework, two officials from the program shared their top tips for helping the workplace culture adjust to a remote environment. […]
Federal IT has proven its value as the vital lifeline between government and citizen service during the COVID-19 pandemic. MeriTalk is chronicling the untold stories of how Federal IT is getting the job done – and lessons for the road to recovery. Our latest chapter of CIO Crossroads explores IT operations at the Department of Education. […]
The U.S. Department of Justice announced charges against two Chinese nationals for hacking into computer systems and stealing intellectual property and business information over more than a 10-year period. […]
President Donald Trump has nominated John Gibbs, who currently serves at the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), as the next director of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) for a term of four years. […]
IT leaders across the Federal government are reviewing lessons learned from the past few months. Most acknowledge that agencies have significantly accelerated modernization efforts as part of their work to effectively support (and secure) mass telework environments. […]
Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Christopher Krebs is saying that the 2020 election “will be the most secure election in modern history,” but continued to advocate for backup paper ballots to ensure an accurate count. […]
The coronavirus pandemic hasn’t slowed the government’s progress on managing the Federal background check inventory, which has returned to a stable state of roughly 200,000 cases, according to a quarterly report on the Security Clearance, Suitability/Fitness, and Credentialing Reform Cross-Agency Priority (CAP) goal action plan from the President’s Management Agenda. […]
Per a July 16 inspector general (IG) report, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) saw use of VA Video Connect increase from 79 calls per week to over 1,100 per week at just one of its facilities during the coronavirus pandemic, despite some bandwidth and scheduling issues reported by facility leaders. […]
Jim Russo, technical director of the Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS) program at the General Services Administration (GSA), and Sean Connelly, program manager of Trusted Internet Connections at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA), reflected this week on the continuous benefits of the EIS vehicle, and explained what each agency brought to the proposal. […]
Efforts to improve the U.S. Coast Guard’s Marine Information for Safety and Law Enforcement (MISLE) data system have fallen short, and the Coast Guard plan to replace the system, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO). […]
Attorney General William Barr said today that China had plans to “dominate the world’s digital infrastructure,” calling artificial intelligence a main part of China’s “drive for technological supremacy.” […]
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued an emergency alert late today urging Federal agencies to take fast action on a patch to fix a Microsoft Windows DNS vulnerability. […]
Cybersecurity agencies in the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada issued a joint warning July 16 accusing Russian intelligence services of targeting COVID-19 research and vaccine development facilities with cyberattacks. […]
The FY2021 Financial Services and General Government (FSGG) appropriations bill approved by the House Appropriations Committee on July 15 asks the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), among other government agencies, to cooperate on a report to Congress that explains limitations to integrating and modernizing Federal health and human services-related IT. […]
In its latest move to clamp down on China-based Huawei’s influence in the United States, the Trump administration is imposing visa restrictions on employees of certain Chinese technology companies. […]
The Department of State was already moving toward accelerated IT modernization in 2019, but the sudden onset of the coronavirus pandemic hastened those efforts and changed the department’s culture in the process, the agency’s CIO said this week. […]
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) hopes to have its contractual support strategy fully transitioned by October 2021—showing no signs of slowed progress due to the COVID-19 pandemic. […]
AI is transforming the way Federal agencies complete mission objectives, and as the technology becomes more effective and efficient, agency leaders are seeking to utilize AI to reshape the future of government work. […]
John Wagner, deputy executive assistant commissioner at U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) – and unofficially the agency’s prime mover behind the use of biometric technologies including facial recognition – is retiring from Federal government service on July 18, after 28 years of service. […]
While the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced last week that it awarded the final $10 million under its $200 million COVID-19 Telehealth Program authorized by the CARES Act, FCC Chairman Ajit Pail talked today about the success of the program, and expressed hope that lawmakers authorize similar programs in the future that will allow the commission to distribute funding quickly. […]
House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., expressed concern in a June 10 letter over a sharp rise in the number of Department of Homeland Security employees testing positive for COVID-19. […]
While the majority of Federal agencies are meeting completeness, timeliness, and accuracy benchmarks for Digital Accountability and Transparency Act of 2014 (DATA Act) reporting, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) concluded that compliance with the legislation still varies across agencies. […]
The American Council for Technology and Industry Advisory Council (ACT-IAC) said it has launched a new tool to improve the acquisition process for Federal agencies. […]
Bob DeLuca, who recently began as deputy CIO of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), will be returning to the General Services Administration (GSA) as acting Technology Transformation Service (TTS) director and the deputy Federal Acquisition Service (FAS) commissioner on detail. […]
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is pushing forward with its Data Center and Cloud Optimization (DCC) efforts, according to a notice posted on beta.sam.gov. […]
The Department of Energy (DoE) Inspector General (IG) warned in a July 6 summary of findings that department’s Office of Science lacked proper peripheral device security, leaving the agency exposed to the possibility of network compromise. […]
A new Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) Council rule will ban U.S. agencies from buying products or utilizing services from companies such as Huawei or ZTE starting August 13. […]