Smarter Gov Tech, Stronger MerITocracy
Veterans Affairs

Reps. Frank Mrvan, D-Ind., Nancy Mace, R-S.C., Susie Lee, D-Nev., and Andrew Garbarino, R-N.Y., have introduced legislation that aims to strengthen cybersecurity at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and better protect information technology systems and devices used at the agency. […]

The Department of the Treasury’s Federal Insurance Office (FIO) published a request for comment today on the Federal Register to help inform a report on the effectiveness of the Terrorism Risk Insurance Program (TRIP) and how to improve the cyber insurance market. […]

Labor

President Biden’s budget request for fiscal year (FY) 2023 is seeking $3.4 billion for the Labor Department (DoL) to help modernize unemployment insurance (UI) systems run by states and territories – many of which were overwhelmed with demand during the coronavirus pandemic. […]

funding

The Department of Defense (DoD) would refill its coffers for cyber investments with $11.2 billion in funding for cyberspace activities under the White House’s budget request for fiscal year (FY) 2023 – which proposes to hike DoD’s cybersecurity-related funding by nearly $1 billion from the prior-year request. […]

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is ready to authorize more than $313 million in funding through the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund for new broadband deployments in 19 states. […]

The White House released President Biden’s fiscal year (FY) 2023 budget request today, with a top-line number of $5.8 trillion and featuring proposals to spend $10.9 billion for civilian cybersecurity measures – marking an 11 percent increase in civilian agency cyber spending from reported FY2022 levels. […]

The U.S. Army has appointed Michael Sulmeyer as the service branch’s new principal cyber adviser, taking the helm from Terry Mitchell who was appointed to the position in September 2020. […]

Air Force

The U.S. Air Force (USAF) is investing in its Cloud One platform to modernize and make applications more portable. However, according to an agency official, executing a migration program of this size is not without its challenges. […]

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced $68 million in funding for its latest round of Emergency Connectivity Fund (ECF) awards on March 23, as well as its third application window for ECF funding, which it says will likely be the last round before the program’s funding is exhausted. […]

The Department of Defense (DoD) recently called cATO the “gold standard” in cybersecurity. However, the current process for obtaining authorization to operate (ATO) is “point in time,” costly, and time consuming. Based on these issues, an alternative, continuous authority to operate (cATO), is gaining momentum. […]

Russia U.S. Hacking

Federal cybersecurity agencies along with the Department of Energy (DOE) have published a new cyber advisory that talks about several Russian hacks on the energy sector between 2011 and 2018 that are the subject of a Department of Justice (DOJ) indictment unsealed this week against Russian actors for those past attacks. […]

The complex legislative process needed to bring congressional leaders together to reconcile differences between Senate-passed and House-passed semiconductor and innovation legislation advanced in the Senate this week, and now stands just a few steps from completion, as lawmakers call for cybersecurity-related components of the bills to make the final cut. […]

The U.S. Navy’s Chief Data Officer (CDO) said the service branch is embarking on a data infrastructure transformation to tackle a two-pronged challenge: first, how to deal with the sheer amount of data collected, and second, understanding if the Navy has the correct kinds of data to help leaders make decisions. […]

New legislation introduced by Sens. Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., and John Cornyn, R-Texas would codify into Federal law the Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation (CDM) program, and provide for a pilot program for state and local governments to deploy the cybersecurity technologies that the CDM program offers. […]

Blockchain link

Blockchain technologies face challenges, but a new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) offers a range of policy recommendations that could help enhance the benefits and mitigate challenges posed by the use of those technologies.  […]

Bipartisan members of the House of Representatives have introduced legislation that would reauthorize the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) National Computer Forensics Institute (NCFI), which is the U.S. Secret Service’s Federally-funded training hub for digital evidence and cybercrime investigations. […]

ransomware

A bipartisan group of senators introduced legislation this week that would require public reporting and notice – eventually – of hundreds of thousands of court-ordered criminal surveillance orders issued  each year that are often kept under seal indefinitely even if the surveillance targets were not accused of any crimes. […]

CISA
EPA Environmental Protection Agency

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has reached an agreement with the union representing agency employees for policies governing the return of employees to traditional offices in what amounts to a larger hybrid work-location approach. […]

cybersecurity

The late-day warning on Monday from President Biden and White House national security officials that the Russian government is exploring options for potential cyberattacks against U.S. critical infrastructure targets appeared to turn many heads in the Federal cybersecurity community that is by now long-used to receiving and generating cybersecurity advisories. […]

The Senate voted March 21 to invoke cloture on House-passed legislation designed to fully fund the CHIPS Act to boost domestic semiconductor production and create a new technology directorate at the National Science Foundation (NSF). […]

We sat down in recent days with Amy Gilliland, who has run General Dynamics Information Technology as president for going on five years, to talk mostly about how the company is helping Federal agencies cybersecurity and zero trust policy mandates, but in the course of a wide-ranging conversation came away with a whole lot more. […]

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence’s (ODNI) Science and Technology Group (STG) is seeking feedback on its Fiscal Year (FY) 2022-2026 Science and Technology (S&T) Investment Landscape, which sets a pathway for its S&T investment portfolio over the next four fiscal years, according to a request for information (RFI) published last month. […]

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