Uncle Sam Federal spending Piggy bank

A new ACT-IAC study found that of 109 solicitations that have completed the General Services Administration (GSA) In-Scope Review (ISR) process, 79 included the move or expansion of Ethernet or Voice Over IP (VOIP). […]

capitol washington dc senate house congress-min
Innovation

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is working with about 60 clinical institutions affiliated with the Clinical and Translational Science Awards Program to support the analysis of electronic health records in a new cloud-based database. […]

General Services Administration GSA Headquarters 1800 F St 18F TTS FAS

When an April tweet about pandemic relief funding from President Trump jolted an 8,000 percent increase in traffic on the Small Business Administration website, the agency was ready to take the strain, having moved the site from on-prem to cloud a year earlier. […]

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded a $10 million grant to the Pervasive Technology Institute at Indiana University (IU) to deploy a distributed cloud computing system that will help support on-demand research, AI, and enhanced large-scale data analyses for the United States. […]

Assessors for the new cybersecurity standard for contractors of the Department of Defense have not yet been selected, but a Department of Homeland Security official praised DoD’s efforts and said his department is looking toward their example. […]

COVID-19

Just over two months after the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, officials at the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) and the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) credit the legislation with expediating the acquisition process to ease the telework transition. […]

USDA Agriculture

Underpinning the delivery of citizen services, funding, and an all-important sense of normalcy during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Federal IT enterprise has provided firm footing in uncertain times. As the nation takes its first steps on the road to recovery, MeriTalk is chronicling the untold stories and lessons of the ongoing IT odyssey. In the latest chapter of CIO Crossroads, we explore the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s IT operations three months into the fray.  […]

Kevin Cox, program manager for the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s (CISA) Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation (CDM) program, confirms that Federal agencies are increasingly integrating CDM into their overall security operations for greater visibility and control. That’s in line with findings from MeriTalk’s latest research, which found 59 percent of agencies incorporating CDM into their broader cyber strategy, rather than viewing it as a standalone function. […]

Russell Vought and Craig Leen shared their priorities as nominees for the permanent director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and inspector general at the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), respectively, at a June 2 Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs hearing. […]

A confluence of trends – including ever-mounting cyber attacks, expanding network attack surfaces stemming from increased teleworking during the coronavirus pandemic, and an enduring shortage of skilled cybersecurity workforce talent – is creating demand for more autonomous cybersecurity technologies. […]

census

Today is “Super Junesday,” with primaries in D.C., Indiana, Maryland, Montana, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and South Dakota. In any other year, this would be a significant day for the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the agency tasked with helping ensure election security across the nation. However, the COVID-19 pandemic and ongoing protests across the country have added an additional stressor. […]

OPM Office of Personnel Management

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) is planning to start re-opening its offices and released a facilities preparedness guide on June 2 that provides an enterprise-wide, risk management assessment for its blueprint to send Feds back to the office. […]

electric grid
Dorothy Aronson

Americans rely on government services 24/7, and even more so during times of crisis. The COVID-19 pandemic has proven the critical importance of Federal IT in sustaining the nation, but left its tech leaders mostly unsung. MeriTalk is surfacing the untold stories – and lessons – of those agency and leadership efforts. In the latest installment of CIO Crossroads, we turn to the National Science Foundation (NSF). […]

DoD Pentagon Military
DHS Homeland Security

While the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has fully planned for its pivot from waterfall to Agile development, about one-third (34 percent) of its planned Agile activities have been deferred to a later start date, according to a June 1 Government Accountability Office (GAO) report. […]

Cybersecurity

The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) released a new cyber essentials toolkit to help small businesses and Federal agencies understand and address cybersecurity risks. […]

NIST

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) developed a mathematical formula that could help wireless networks, including 5G, select and share communications frequencies more efficiently. […]

quantum computer processor chip intel computing hardware

Does it really take a team of rocket scientists to rapidly engineer a top-notch line of personal protective equipment (PPE) to protect against COVID-19 spread? And then to open source its production designs for the benefit of anyone with access to a 3D printer? […]

Veterans Affairs

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) – largely because of its broad, hands-on healthcare mission – is not the type of Federal agency that can transform to near 100 percent telework. But that didn’t stop the agency from more than tripling its telework capacity to meet the demands of the COVID-19 pandemic, said agency CIO James Gfrerer during a May 28 AFCEA Bethesda webinar event. […]

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