In light of this year’s cyberattack on Colonial Pipeline and other critical infrastructure targets in the United States, the Department of Homeland Security’s Transportation Security Administration (TSA) component is prepping a new cybersecurity directive covering “high-risk” railroad operations, according to DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. […]
With an increased focus on cybersecurity after a spate of high-profile cyberattacks on U.S. government and business organizations since late last year, members of Congress are continuing to call for a clearly defined national cyber deterrent policy. Three prime movers on cybersecurity legislation Congress – Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, and Reps. John Katko, R-N.Y., and Yvette Clarke, D-N.Y. – explained the need to codify a cyber deterrence policy at the Aspen Cyber Summit Oct. 6. […]
Reps. John Katko, R-N.Y., and Abigail Spanberger, D-Va., introduced a bipartisan bill in the House this week that aims to protect systemically important critical infrastructure (SICI) from cyberattacks. […]
The Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee voted today to approve the Cyber Incident Reporting Act, which would require critical infrastructure operators to report cyberattacks to the Federal government, and require most government and business entities to report to the government if they make a ransomware payment. […]
The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee voted unanimously today to advance for full Senate consideration of a bill that would extensively overhaul the 2014 version of the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA) that sets cybersecurity requirements for Federal civilian agencies. […]
In September, the Department of the Treasury took a series of actions to combat ransomware, including sanctioning a virtual currency exchange for facilitating financial transactions for ransomware actors. Treasury’s actions follow a Transportation Security Administration (TSA) security directive requiring owners and operators of TSA-designated critical pipelines to protect against ransomware attacks, and discussions between President Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin about ransomware attacks from Russian soil. […]
Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco said today the Department of Justice (DoJ) is launching two new initiatives to combat cyber threats, including the creation of a National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team, and a civil cyber fraud initiative that will fine Federal contractors who don’t follow required cybersecurity standards. […]
The House on September 29 passed the K-12 Cybersecurity Act – a piece of bipartisan legislation from Sens. Gary Peters, D-Mich., and Rick Scott, R-Fla., with a companion bill in the House led by Rep. Jim Langevin, D-R.I. The bill has already been approved by the Senate, and has been sent to the White House for President Biden’s signature. […]
The Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) has created a new Hosting and Compute Center (HaCC), and has named Sharon Woods, the executive director of DISA’s Cloud Computing Program Office (CCPO), as the HaCC acting director, a DISA spokesperson confirmed to MeriTalk. […]
The Department of Defense’s (DoD) Responsible AI Lead at the Joint AI Center (JAIC), Alka Patel, left her post Oct. 1, she announced in a LinkedIn post. […]
Federal CIO Clare Martorana emphasized today that the road to Federal agency IT improvements runs not only through agency CIO offices, but also needs to benefit from support from the entire organization’s executive suite. […]
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has awarded Peraton a nearly $2.7 billion dollar contract to aid the agency’s move to the cloud, according to an Oct. 4 award announcement posted to SAM.gov. […]
The Democratic and Republican leaders of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee have unveiled their long-awaited legislation to update the 2014 Federal Information Security Modernization Act that provides cybersecurity marching orders to Federal civilian agencies. […]
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), partnering with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), has released new guidance on mitigating security risks to advance quantum computing technology. […]
As the cyber threats we face become more diverse across the nation and globe, security, and IT operations teams must encompass diverse perspectives. For MeriTalking’s first installment of the “Human Side of Cyber” series, MeriTalk’s Nicole Burdette sits down with Teddra Burgess, Senior Vice President, Public Sector at Tanium to dive into the importance of having diverse perspectives and experiences on an organization’s cyber response team. […]
The Democratic leaders of the House and Senate made official over the weekend what had become obvious by late last week: the hoped-for late September votes on two big Federal infrastructure funding bills were sliding into October. […]
A sampling of Federal agencies’ efforts to provide remote access for telework during the COVID-19 pandemic shows that each of the agencies was able to put the right technologies in place to accomplish that goal, but that several had not fully addressed relevant guidance for securing remote access systems, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found. […]
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) received a mostly favorable review from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) on how the agency is proceeding with improving broadband service access maps, but GAO also flagged that the FCC will face technological challenges with integrating disparate sources of broadband service location data. […]
The National Science Foundation (NSF) is investing $1 million in research and development (R&D) to create open-source first responder robots. […]
The Department of Defense (DoD) has been working to establish a software acquisition pathway that emphasizes rapid delivery and user engagement, but the Pentagon has not collected data or developed tools needed to oversee programs using the pathways, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO). […]
A dizzying array of AI ethics, policies, and technical working groups already in play among Federal departments and agencies has led to an overall body of policies that may be incomplete, inconsistent, or incompatible with each other, a new report says. […]
The Department of Defense announced the members of its recently restarted Defense Business Board, one of 16 advisory boards recently restarted after a Feb. 3 pause. […]
The National Security Agency (NSA) and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) released a joint Cybersecurity Information Sheet that helps detail factors for choosing a virtual private network (VPN) and secure deployment. […]
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has partnered with Girls Who Code (GWC) to develop pathways for young women to pursue careers in cybersecurity and technology, the agency announced Sept. 30. […]
The Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) Board on September 30 announced seven new awards totaling $311 million to fund Federal agency investments into zero trust networking and digital identity, standardizing secure data and information sharing, and improving interagency collaboration. […]
The FCC has announced a second set of awards for round two of its COVID-19 telehealth program, totaling more than $41.11 million to healthcare providers. […]
Dominic Sale, who for years helped lead Federal government IT modernization efforts at the General Services Administration (GSA), left government service earlier this month for a new position with Dynamic Integrated Services (DIS), a provider of IT, enterprise, and communications solutions to government and other customers. […]
The September 29 kick-off meeting of the Trade and Technology Council (TTC) created earlier this year by the United States, European Commission, and European Council produced initial commitments by the three parties to coordinate on technology issues including the development of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, and semiconductor supply chains. […]
The General Services Administration’s (GSA) plans to develop an online marketplace to measure and monitor data protection efforts will need further development to prevent data misuse, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said in a new report. […]
The House Oversight and Reform Committee is seeking a briefing on how the FBI handled the ransomware attack on Kaseya that affected up to 1,500 businesses worldwide, according to a letter today from the committee leadership to FBI Director Christopher Wray. […]