Officials from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) noted the importance of enforcing and creating programs to support data security and privacy for Internet of Things (IoT) devices during the Internet of Things Global Summit on Thursday. […]

The Department of Justice (DoJ) today announced that a grand jury has indicted seven officers, all Russian nationals and residents, in the Russian Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU), a military intelligence agency of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. […]

Following the long-awaited passage of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Act in the Senate, the head of the organization set to be elevated as the nation’s official cybersecurity agency expressed his satisfaction at how congressional approval of a simple name change will reinforce the authority of the Federal government’s lead organization in cyberspace. […]

The Senate passed the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Act (CISA Act) on Wednesday by unanimous consent but included some amendments, setting up a few remaining steps before the bill reaches President Trump’s desk. […]

Matt Lira, special assistant to the president for innovation, policy, and initiatives at the White House Office of American Innovation, has a unique visualization exercise to help consider how we should address problems in the Federal IT space. […]

Congress is getting behind the push to develop artificial intelligence technologies and policies with recent calls for research and development that may overlap efforts already underway. It also reflects the kind of “whole of country” approach that some leaders have said is necessary to keep up with the Chinese. […]

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) today released NIST Internal Report 8202, Blockchain Technology Overview. […]

Federal CIO Suzette Kent called today’s first official test of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System a “historic event,” highlighting the test as evidence of the expanding role of mobile technologies and their impact on a broader effort toward digital transformation in the Federal government. […]

California Governor Jerry Brown on Sept. 29 signed S.B. 1001 into law. The legislation prohibits automated accounts–colloquially known as bots–from pretending to be human when attempting to “incentivize a purchase or sale of goods or services in a commercial transaction or to influence a vote in an election.” […]

A group of 24 technology organizations banded together to urge the Senate to pass S. 3157, the STREAMLINE Small Cell Deployment Act. In a letter released today, the group said the legislation “will modernize wireless infrastructure regulations for next-generation 5G wireless networks” and will unlock “significant consumer and economic benefits.” […]

Andrew Saul, the White House’s nominee for commissioner of Social Security, noted his commitment to continue the Social Security Administration’s (SSA) IT modernization efforts during a Senate Finance Committee hearing yesterday. […]

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) will in the coming weeks release a new regulation that will allow the Federal government to directly hire cybersecurity personnel, significantly slimming a lengthy hiring process that has bogged down the Federal government. […]

Locked in our technology siloes, the word “cloud” has become common vernacular. Working in IT, we know what it means, and we know at this point the kind of potential cloud computing unlocks. It’s not a big step to say that it will underpin technological innovation for the foreseeable future. […]

The General Services Administration announced several companies receiving awards for “critical work” at the Centers of Excellence (CoEs) within the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), advancing the Centers of Excellence initiative into phase II. […]

At the National Association of Corporate Directors Global Board Leaders Summit on Monday, Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) Director Christopher Wray stressed that the FBI and corporate executives must work together to keep companies safe from cybercrime. Wray called on executives to report cyber incidents to the FBI as soon as possible, explaining that the FBI needed the info to have a clear understanding of the current threat landscape. […]

Defense Department CIO Dana Deasy said today that DoD is currently sorting through the FY 2019 budget allocation for the new Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC), and likely will be creating outposts for JAIC to spur outreach to members of academia. […]

California’s Democratic Governor Jerry Brown on Sunday signed S.B. 822 , which restores in the state Obama-era Federal net neutrality laws that were gutted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) earlier this year. […]

President Trump on Friday declared October 2018 as National Cybersecurity Awareness Month – marking the 15th consecutive year of that designation. […]

As Federal agencies’ cloud migrations lead to the deployment of multi-cloud environments, agency technology managers must understand the dependencies between infrastructure, operating models, and applications. […]

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) yesterday issued a warning that cyber actors are increasingly exploiting the Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) to conduct malicious activity. […]

Whole-of-government collaboration on quantum computing appears to have kicked up yet another notch today with an announcement that the National Institute of Standards and Technology has reached a deal to establish a Quantum Economic Development Consortium (QEDC). […]

Facebook said it informed users on Friday the company discovered attackers using a new technique to potentially take over user accounts–putting 50 million accounts at risk and forcing the company to take preventative action on 90 million accounts. […]

Pentagon officials have been pretty clear about their belief that artificial intelligence is changing the game for military operations, saying that AI will penetrate “every corner” of the Department of Defense, in the words of Brendan McCord, head of machine learning at the Defense Innovation Unit. DoD Chief Information Officer Dana Deasy lists AI among his four most important strategic areas. Defense Secretary James Mattis reportedly pushed for a “whole of country” approach earlier this year as the White House was announcing its Select Committee on Artificial Intelligence. […]

Rep Will Hurd, R-Texas, chairman of the House IT subcommittee, questioned today whether Google’s decision in June to not renew a contract with the Defense Department for development of artificial intelligence technologies was influenced by what the congressman characterized as possible “influence operations” by the Chinese government. […]

With artificial intelligence (AI) the topic du jour on Capitol Hill, Sens. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii; Cory Gardner, R-Colo.; Rob Portman, R-Ohio; and Kamala Harris, D-Calif., on Wednesday introduced the Artificial Intelligence in Government Act that would establish a Federal AI advisory board that aims to chart paths forward in the technology’s development. […]

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on Wednesday voted to approve a handful of bills that place a strong emphasis on cybersecurity, IT supply chain security, and the enhancement of digital citizen services. […]

As the Federal government shifts its cloud strategy from “Cloud First” to “Cloud Smart,” IT leaders at the Infor Government Forum described how their previous cloud migration efforts have shifted their agencies’ mindsets and brought new successes to their department. […]

The Senate Armed Services Committee’s cybersecurity and personnel subcommittees held a joint hearing today to examine the cyber operational readiness of the Department of Defense and heard from leaders of both the military and civilian side of the DoD cyber force about the mounting challenges they face. […]

The House late Tuesday voted to approve H.R. 6735, a bill that directs the Homeland Security Secretary to establish a vulnerability disclosure policy for the agency’s websites. […]

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) today approved by a 3-1, party-line vote a series of steps that its Republican-majority commissioners argue will speed the pace of infrastructure installations necessary for carriers to provide 5G wireless services, but which have drawn strong protest from states and localities in the run-up to today’s vote who object to restrictions on their ability to govern. […]