Smarter Gov Tech, Stronger MerITocracy
military healthcare, veterans healthcare

The Department of Veterans Affairs announced a new telehealth initiative and new health application programming interface (API) this week, furthering the department’s commitment to caring for veterans with the help of technology. […]

The General Services Administration announced Thursday that it will extend the lifespan of legacy networking contracts up to three years, pushing back the deadline for agencies to move to the Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS) contract.  […]

DHS Homeland Security

The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS’) Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) announced on Thursday that they are granting $1.1 million to two projects aimed at improving data privacy for the department.  […]

Rod Turk, the Commerce Department’s acting CIO who will be retiring next month, said in a wide-ranging discussion today that the Federal government is approaching the “tipping point” in its IT modernization efforts, and that requirements put in place in recent years to strengthen the hand of Federal CIOs in pushing modernization are resulting in less “rogue” tech projects at agencies. […]

The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) for the General Services Administration (GSA) released its report on the agency’s biggest management challenges on Nov. 30, with the report highlighting OIG’s disagreement with GSA on the state of internal controls within the agency. […]

Microsoft HQ
Emily Murphy GSA

Emily Murphy, administrator at the General Services Administration (GSA), detailed the agency’s plan to consolidate 24 multiple-award schedules into one, and how the change will benefit both agencies and industry. […]

Department of Homeland Security DHS
Rod Rosenstein

U.S. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein voiced a forceful argument on Thursday for tech device and service makers to build into their products the means for law enforcement to legally access decrypted content, but offered little that was new in the way of solutions to the problem which the Federal government has complained about for years. […]

Congress Capitol Senate House

The House on Wednesday approved by voice vote HR 6032, the SMART IoT Act, which would direct the Department of Commerce to study and report to Congress within one year on the U.S. Internet-connected device industry, including on voluntary and mandatory standards that are being developed around the world for the IoT sector, which Federal agencies have jurisdiction over the sector, and any regulations or standards those agencies have put in place that impact the IoT sector. […]

jeanette manfra dhs nppd oc&c assistant secretary

When it comes to eliminating botnets, Jeanette Manfra, assistant director for Cybersecurity for the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, stressed the importance of thinking differently and considering new solutions at the unveiling the 2018 International Anti-Botnet Guide today. […]

General Services Administration GSA

When it comes to customer experience in the Federal government, customers can be like your children: you love them and want to help them succeed, but you don’t get to pick them, and you have to work toward their high expectations. That was the message from Anahita Reilly, chief customer officer at the General Services Administration (GSA), during a speech today at Deloitte’s Creating a Future Forward event. […]

Dell said on Nov. 28 that it “detected and disrupted” unauthorized activity on its network on Nov. 9 that aimed to steal Dell.com customer information including names, email addresses, and hashed passwords, but not credit card or other sensitive data. Dell said “it is possible” that some data was stolen, but that “our investigations found no conclusive evidence that any was extracted.” Dell said its security measures in place–including hashing of customer passwords and a mandatory Dell.com password reset–are in place to limit the impact of any potential data disclosure. The company also said it has hired an digital forensics firm to conduct an independent investigate, and also has “engage law enforcement.” […]

health

The Department of Health and Human Services on Nov. 28 issued a draft strategy that the agency said is “designed to help reduce administrative and regulatory burdens on clinicians” stemming from use of health information technologies including electronic health records. […]

military healthcare, veterans healthcare

The Department of Veterans Affairs admitted this month that its 10-year, $10 billion-plus project to create an interoperable electronic health record system incurred a $350 million cost overrun right out of the gate–a potential red flag in the latest effort to develop an integrated records system that also works with the Department of Defense’s system. […]

Veterans Affairs VA Vets

The Department of Veterans Affairs said today it is targeting Dec. 1, 2019–a full year from now–to complete a technical fix to address problems that have plagued the agency’s ability to correctly calculate monthly housing allowance payments under the 2017 Colmery Veterans Educational Assistance Act, also known as the “Forever GI Bill.” […]

student aid, funding, student loans, education department, college

Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos highlighted the success of the Department of Education’s mobile applications during a speech on Tuesday, pointing to their convenience and ability to reach citizens in an effective manner. […]

The Department of Justice said today it indicted eight people from Russia and Kazakhstan allegedly involved in two cybercriminal rings engaged in digital advertising fraud. […]

GSA General Services Administration

General Services Administration officials said today they expect their plan to consolidate 24 multiple award schedules into a single schedule for products and services to take about two years to complete, and that the effort is expected to yield workforce cost savings and efficiencies for both GSA and private sector partners that sell to the Federal government. […]

In an Inspector General (IG) report released Nov. 20, the Department of the Interior got taken to task for allowing an employee to visit 9,000 pornographic websites in under seven months. This is the IG second report chastising the department for an employee viewing porn on agency time and technology. […]

cloud computing concept -min

The General Services Administration (GSA) released a request for information detailing part of the Federal Acquisition Service’s (FAS’) new CIO Modernization and Enterprise Transformation contract–named COMET for short–and highlighted the guiding principles of cloud-native solutions, SecDevOps, and data management. […]

General Services Administration GSA

The General Services Administration (GSA) announced on Tuesday that the agency is condensing its 24 multiple award schedules, including IT Schedule 70, into a single schedule for products and services, in a move that it says will simplify acquisitions for Federal agencies. […]

NSF National Science Foundation

The National Science Foundation (NSF) is looking to use cloud services to speed up the agency’s scientific discoveries and offer researchers more tools through a new program named Exploring Clouds for Acceleration of Science, or E-CAS. […]

Secret Service Presidential Motorcade

A Government Accountability Office (GAO) report found that while the CIO of the U.S. Secret Service had implemented most IT oversight responsibilities, the agency still needs to improve its workforce planning and management practices. […]

IRS

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) failed to record compromised taxpayer identification numbers (TINs) for 89 breaches reported to the agency by outside organizations, putting over 11,000 taxpayers at risk and leading to tax return fraud for 79 citizens, according to an audit conducted by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA). […]

OPM Office of Personnel Management
elections, election security, voting

Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., announced Tuesday her intention to restore the Elections Subcommittee of the Committee on House Administration, which was created during the 110th Congress but abolished in 2013. Pelosi, who will likely be elected House majority leader when Democrats take control of the House in January, also announced that Rep. Marcia Fudge, D-Ohio, will serve as chairwoman of the subcommittee. […]

NASA

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