The White House called on the Senate to appropriate FY2019 funding for the Technology Modernization Fund (TMF), although it did not suggest a specific funding level in a statement of administration policy issued by the Office of Management and Budget on Tuesday. […]
Federal CIO Suzette Kent, testifying today at a joint subcommittee hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said that the Federal government intends to complete all of the tasks outlined in the Federal IT Modernization Report by the end of the year. She said that the majority of those tasks are already complete, and that many have beaten the timelines the government had set for itself. […]
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report today finding that three-quarters of major Federal agencies maintain incomplete, untimely, inaccurate, or poor-quality spending data, and that around half of them are not even implementing required data standards in the first place. […]
Grant Schneider, currently the acting Federal chief information security officer, has been named Federal CISO on a permanent basis, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) announced on Thursday. As CISO, Schneider is tasked with implementing cybersecurity practices across the executive branch, as well as serving as a policy advisor for the Trump administration. […]
July 21 is a deadline that looms large for the Trump administration to provide more information to Senate appropriators about the Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) and why legislators should change their recommendation made on June 21 to zero out funding for TMF for fiscal year 2019. […]
Margaret Weichert, deputy director for management at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and one of the Trump administration’s most visible point persons promoting its plan to reorganize numerous aspects of Federal civilian agencies, said on Wednesday that the first fruits of that plan may be efforts to standardize aspects of the Federal cybersecurity workforce, ease the backlog of Federal background checks, and make improvements in the provision of government digital services generally. […]
At today’s TBM Council Public Sector Summit, three government leaders stressed the importance of evolving the Federal government’s Capital Planning and Investment Control (CPIC) process and the role Technology Business Management (TBM) can play in that evolution. […]
Federal CIO Suzette Kent and General Services Administration (GSA) CIO David Shive both offered their support for using Technology Business Management (TBM) in Federal agencies at today’s TBM Council Public Sector Summit. […]
Welcome to MeriTalk News Briefs, where we bring you all the day’s action that didn’t quite make the headlines. No need to shout about ‘em, but we do feel that they merit talk. […]
Jordan Burris, senior cybersecurity advisor to Federal CIO Suzette Kent at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), said Friday at an Information Security and Privacy Advisory Board (ISPAB) meeting that Federal agencies are continuing to make progress on curbing their cybersecurity risks, following concerning findings from the White House. […]
The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) will release a new government-wide Federal cloud computing strategy sometime in the next few months, OMB Digital Services Expert Bill Hunt said Wednesday at ATARC’s Cloud & Data Center Summit. […]
Federal agencies are facing a tall order in cleaning up their cybersecurity practices in the wake of some tough love dished out by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in a risk assessment and action plan released May 30. Agencies need to streamline processes, better share information, and finds ways of getting a better return on their cyber investments, all of which can be harder than it sounds. […]
The digital transformation in government IT is driving modernization but also expanding the attack surface Federal agencies have to protect. The traditional perimeter no longer exists. Today, there is no “inside” or “outside” the network when it comes to detecting, defending, and deterring cyber attacks. […]
We sat down with Jeff Henry, president of ViON, in his office in Herndon, Va. The typical tech provider surroundings belied the epic changes at ViON, as it morphs from leading data center reseller to delivering government IT modernization as a service. […]
We are happy to present the inaugural edition of MeriTalk News Briefs, where we bring you all the day’s action that didn’t quite make the headlines. No need to shout about ‘em, but we do feel that they merit talk. […]
A new White House report says three quarters of Federal agencies are not managing their cybersecurity risk correctly and are consequently at “risk or high risk” of data theft or network intrusion due to poor cybersecurity programs. […]
The House Oversight and Government Reform (OGR) IT subcommittee followed up last week’s release of the sixth FITARA Scorecard (Scorecard 6.0) by releasing a second, more detailed scorecard. It provides insight into each of the categories of FITARA scoring, with methodology, metrics, calculations, and detailed data points on just how well each of the 24 agencies fared. […]
As Federal agencies move away from older telecom contract vehicles and transition to the new Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS) contract–completion of which is due by the spring of 2020–a logical place to start is with conducting an inventory of all network devices. This will provide a good look at what type of future network is needed to achieve mission goals and objectives. […]
A new government-wide strategic plan on Category Management covering FY18-FY20 and released in late April aligns with the President’s Management Agenda and declares the Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions contracting vehicle one of its key IT components. […]
Action plans to accelerate Federal agency migrations to cloud platforms and services as outlined in the White House IT Modernization Report have been in effect for nearly three months now. For instance, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) was directed to conduct a data call within 30 days of the report’s release, requesting agencies to identify systems that might be ready for cloud migration, but have not because of some perceived or encountered difficulties. […]
The new President’s Management Agenda (PMA) outlines 14 Cross-Agency Priority (CAP) goals to foster better government services. Goal No.1? IT Modernization. And the other 13 goals buttress and intersect across the board with that overarching directive to build more modern, secure, and resilient IT systems. […]
The new President’s Management Agenda solidified the administration’s focus on IT modernization. In the 54-page agenda, released last week, the White House laid out its roadmap for improving the Federal government. Central to its plans? Modernizing the government’s IT infrastructure. […]
It’s an old axiom: “you can’t manage what you can’t measure.” And nowhere is that axiom truer these days than with Federal IT investments. Federal executives need to better understand, manage, and show value from money spent on IT resources. […]
On Tuesday, President Trump released his management agenda, which focused heavily on his IT modernization goals. Top of mind for the administration? Improving the customer experience, helping agencies better deliver on their missions, and reducing costs to the taxpayer. […]
The cloud is not a one-size fits all solution, and, as such, the government is looking to invest in two or three cloud models to support the differing security and risk-tolerance postures of agencies and to leverage various shared services, according to the President’s IT Modernization Report. […]
In a report released on Dec. 7, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) reported that while Veterans Affairs (VA) has made some progress on key IT initiatives under Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA) requirements, it has nonetheless fallen short of Office of Management and Budget (OMB) targets regarding consolidating and optimizing its data centers. […]
The White House wants to clear the way for Federal agencies to adopt commercial cloud computing, even if that means tweaking acquisition rules to help them get there. […]
The GSA is concerned that current cloud procurement methods are leading to confusion and a lack compliance with FedRAMP requirements. To curb the contract discrepancies, the GSA released a new RFI seeking industry input to “identify examples of preferred contract language agencies should incorporate to convey FedRAMP requirements in their solicitations,” according to a FedRAMP blog. […]
The White House Office of Management and Budget issued a memorandum for agencies to submit their Federal Information Security Modernization Act reports to the Government Accountability Office by March 1, 2018. […]
As Federal agencies and the Office of Management and Budget work to develop reorganization plans as part of a March executive order, Congress needs to improve its oversight of those agencies, Sen. Heidi Heitkamp D-N.D., said at a Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee hearing. […]