The Defense Innovation Board (DIB) released a study and draft implementation plan today to help the Department of Defense (DoD) overhaul its software acquisition processes, with DoD looking to pilot some of the recommendations in fiscal year 2020 and implement on a department-wide basis in the FY2021 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). […]
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is requesting information on stabilizing high-priority IT applications, while simultaneously not affecting operational activities. […]
A new executive order released today by the White House establishes a rotational assignment program for Federal cybersecurity personnel, requires agencies to incorporate cybersecurity aptitude assessments into their personnel development programs, and emphasizes the adoption of the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education (NICE) Framework in government contracts, among other measures. […]
From the still-budding promise of automation technologies to the ever-growing threat of cyber vulnerabilities, partnerships both within the private sector and with the Federal government will shape the contours of large-scale IT advancement in the coming years, explained Yogesh Khanna, CTO at General Dynamics Information Technology, at GDIT’s Emerge event in Washington on Tuesday. […]
Federal CIO Suzette Kent emphasized in an address today to tech-sector officials the importance of scaling, sustaining, and “industrializing” technology advancements notched by the Federal government including those featured in the President’s Management Agenda (PMA) issued one year ago. […]
A new report from ACT-IAC (American Council for Technology-Industry Advisory Council) finds that zero-trust technologies are available and lend themselves to incremental installation, but need support from the mission side of the agency for effective implementation. […]
As part of the recent White House executive order on artificial intelligence (AI), Federal agencies will see a push to use AI to improve citizen experience, and an increased effort to catalog investments in AI, said Dr. Lynne Parker, assistant director for artificial intelligence at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). […]
Broadband access is essential in the 21st Century. To achieve availability across the country, the Federal government must have accurate broadband access data to ensure that funds and resources are being spent to expand coverage to unserved areas. However, accuracy issues with the broadband map have plagued the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)–the Federal entity tasked with compiling the data. […]
Defense Department (DoD) officials today underscored the importance of the agency’s ongoing electronic health records (EHR) modernization efforts at a Senate Appropriations Committee Defense Subcommittee hearing on the Defense Health Program FY2020 budget request. […]
A new study from MeriTalk finds that 83 percent of IT problems in the Federal government can be solved by unplugging the system, and plugging it back in. […]
Congress must take action to ensure that consumer data is being adequately protected at consumer reporting agencies (CRAs), witnesses said at Tuesday’s House Committee on Oversight and Reform Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy hearing. […]
The U.S. Marshals Service (USMS) is looking for the best ways to improve its employee’s work-life by improving mobile computing and to do that, they’re focusing more on thinking outside the box. […]
The House Committee on Energy and Commerce’s Subcommittee on Communications and Technology met today to hear testimony on H.R. 1644, the Save the Internet Act, which would roll back net neutrality rules to their 2015 level. […]
In a letter dated Feb. 27, Sens. Mark Warner, D-Va., and Marco Rubio, R-Fla., requested Dan Coats, director of National Intelligence, produce “an unclassified report on the participation of China and other adversarial nations in the international standard setting bodies (ISSBs) for fifth-generation wireless telecommunications technologies (5G).” […]
During her keynote address at Monday’s Center for Strategic and International Studies event, Rep. Suzan DelBene, D-Wash., urged the U.S. government to increase its global engagement when it comes to tech–saying that was the only way to maintain U.S. technological leadership. With that in mind, DelBene offered a series of steps Congress can take to maintain U.S. global leadership. […]
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., on Tuesday released the Democratic roster for the Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress, which was created as part of a House Rules package adopted earlier this month when Democratic leadership took over in the House. Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., has not yet named the committee’s Republican members. […]
As Federal agency leaders look to modernize networks and provide better citizen services, they need to have a “Citizen First” mentality, rather than “Cloud First” or “Cloud Smart,” Claire Bailey, director of Federal, State and Local Mainframe Solutions at Compuware, told MeriTalk. […]
Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Ala., the new chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, is pushing for a hearing on 5G wireless deployment and said the STREAMLINE Small Cell Deployment Act could be a good jumping off point for the hearing, according to a Politico report. […]
On Monday, the Senate unanimously passed the Reliable Emergency Alert Distribution Improvement (READI) Act. The READI Act will “ensure more people receive relevant emergency alerts on their mobile phones, televisions, and radios, explore new ways of alerting the public through online video and audio streaming services, track and study false alerts when they occur, and improve the way states plan for emergency alerts,” according to a press release from the bill’s sponsor Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii. The bipartisan legislation was also championed by Sens. John Thune, R-S.D., and Roger Wicker, R-Miss. […]
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. […]
Microsoft today announced that it plans to expand its rural broadband initiative, dubbed the Airband initiative, to reach an additional 1 million rural Americans. […]
How do you get 1,000 folks out of bed in Las Vegas before 7:00 a.m.? […]
In a letter to Walter Copan, undersecretary of Commerce for Standards and Technology and director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Mo., called on NIST to create a framework for the development and use of facial recognition technologies. […]
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 private sector is the prime driver for Congress to take up data privacy legislation in 2019, industry panelists said Thursday at an event organized by Bloomberg Government. […]
TechCongress, a nonpartisan initiative, is using a $1 million investment from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to “increase government knowledge of emerging technology issues and inform policymaking,” according to a Knight Foundation press release dated Nov. 2. […]
The International Telecommunication Union–a United Nations agency for information and communications technology–announced the re-election of Houlin Zhao of China as ITU Secretary-General. […]
Freedom House’s annual report on internet freedom, entitled “Freedom on the Net” and released today, finds that global internet freedom is on the decline for the eighth consecutive year. […]
The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) recently founded an artificial intelligence (AI) community of interest (COI) for anyone in DHS with an “interest in the subject.” […]
The Navy is taking software development, particularly with regard to maritime cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, and development operations, out to sea. […]