Smarter Gov Tech, Stronger MerITocracy

With the Department of Defense focused on artificial intelligence (AI) to support the warfighter, cloud computing will be a big part in getting tools out to the tactical edge, said Dana Deasy, CIO of the department, at GDIT Emerge on April 23. […]

With the increasing ubiquity of internet of things (IoT) devices and the vast expansion of the cyber attack surface that those devices create, National Security Agency (NSA) IoT Enterprise Functional Team Lead Arlene Santos is emphasizing the importance of the IoT Cybersecurity Improvement Act reintroduced in Congress last month as way to address the cybersecurity concerns posed by rapid IoT device growth. […]

Boosting the use of cloud services may be the answer to expanding implementation of zero-trust models of cybersecurity across Federal agencies and departments, Education Department CISO Steven Hernandez said at an ACT-IAC meeting today. […]

DoD Pentagon Military

The U.S. Army is partnering with the Air Force to use the Common Cloud Environment as part of the Army’s Cloud Strategic Framework, said Thomas Sasala, the Army’s chief data officer, on April 9. […]

Computers cloud connected-min

The Small Business Administration Office of the Inspector General, or SBA OIG, raised concerns about oversight of the agency’s cloud migration, contracts with cloud providers, and ability to move data to other services in a report released April 9. […]

hybrid cloud multi cloud computing in the cloud

As part of an aggressive cloud migration plan, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is aiming to move 350 apps – or about half the department’s portfolio – to the cloud by 2024, said VA CIO James Gfrerer today at ACT-IAC’s Health Innovation Day 2019. […]

For agencies looking at a multi-cloud strategy, managing different vendors and gaining expertise in different clouds is key to take advantage of the nuanced differences and prevent cloud sprawl, said Sanjay Gupta, chief technology officer for the Small Business Administration (SBA). […]

cloud computing

The Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) gave a 12-month provisional authorization to the Project Host Federal Private Cloud (PJHFPC) on April 1. PJHFPC is a platform as a service private cloud that hosts Impact Level 5 (IL5) controlled unclassified information data, and it has systems and services that manage access control, authentication, auditing, monitoring, scanning, […]

Moving data into the cloud has been a key component to building more secure and interoperable healthcare data and systems, and panelists showcased how that move has both empowered patients and driven precision medicine research forward at today’s CXO Health IT Modernization Tech Forum. […]

Federal Cloud Flag

One of the major wrinkles to iron out in the Federal government’s move to the cloud has been security. Concerns regarding security have prompted some agencies to move cautiously, and the government to create whole programs dedicated to ensuring it. But cloud also provides some security advantages, which the Department of Defense (DoD) is taking advantage of to provide services to warfighters and small-business contractors. […]

Cloud computing

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) secretary outlined how it will use its proposed budget to improve veteran healthcare and modernize its largely outdated information technology (IT) systems at a hearing today before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies. […]

NASA JPL blog series

Never, in human history, have we seen this much technological change in such a short period of time. As technology grows more powerful, every facet of society has raced to adapt. It is exciting (and perhaps a bit daunting) that approaching advancements will probably hit faster, and may be even more dramatic, than changes that […]

Missouri University of Science and Technology (S&T) has pioneered a graduate school program that emphasizes data science, cyber-physical, and cybersecurity research – particularly on the front of cloud computing – to a degree that has earned it Federal recognition. […]

The Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Inspector General (OIG) believes that the agency violated the Federal Records Act when it destroyed an employee’s notes that document a security report of EPA’s cloud service provider. […]

A new analysis from Apptio, a maker of technology business management (TBM) software as a service applications, finds that Federal agencies were on average spending less than two percent of their IT budgets on cloud services in fiscal year 2018, lagging far behind a reported spend rate for the private sector. […]

cloud computing concept -min

The question of the best way for transitioning to cloud infrastructures is a big one for Federal agencies. One approach to solve this issue is a slow, measured migration. Another approach is a more dramatic transformation in a shorter period that might be painful, but allows agencies to reap the benefits of cloud migration much sooner. The best approach for agencies to successfully transition depends on the agency itself, its mission, and what officials are looking to achieve. […]

Controlling cloud costs in today’s hybrid and multi-cloud environments can be a challenge for many Federal technology managers after a migration or cloud-native application deployment. There are so many variables to consider, from operational to contracts and licensing issues, that if the process is not well managed costs can spiral out of control. […]

GSA General Services Administration

The General Services Administration announced Thursday that they are adding a category for cloud-oriented IT professional services to IT Schedule 70 under the Cloud Special Item Number (SIN), as well as draft updates for existing software SINs. […]

cloud computing concept -min
Computers cloud connected-min

The move by government organizations to public cloud infrastructure is often motivated by a desire to provide better services to citizens, but an academic piece warns about the need to maintain public access to open data in the cloud. […]

hybrid cloud multi cloud computing in the cloud

As Federal technology managers increasingly operate in a hybrid, multi-cloud world, having a holistic view of their agency’s application landscape and architecture will help in mapping the right workload to the right type of cloud deployment. […]

Military AI DoD Defense
Cloud computing

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) released a request for information (RFI) on Tuesday asking for support in moving systems to the cloud, optimizing its remaining enterprise data center, and gathering comment on the department’s plan. The deadline to respond is March 20. […]

The Department of Defense’s recently released Cloud Strategy covers a lot of territory, from an emphasis on the multibillion dollar Joint Enterprise Defense Initiative as a foundation of its plans, to its description of seven strategic objectives it wants to achieve in the cloud. One of those objectives is to extend tactical support to warfighters at the network edge to give units in the field the technology and tactical information they need to operate in a battlefield where seamless communications are essential and where cyber operations and electronic warfare are an increasingly important factor. […]

Cybersecurity cyber

Discussions this morning with a Federal agency IT professional and an IT acquisition professional revealed very different views of the Federal government’s security posture.

Shared on the condition of no attribution during an AFCEA (Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association) Bethesda event Tuesday morning, the speakers’ varying opinions showed how the balance between security and effectiveness is an issue still up for debate. […]

Military Data Center

The Defense Department’s newly published cloud strategy leans heavily on several core concepts including maximizing competition among cloud service providers, sticking to a single cloud strategy, leveraging commercial-sector best practices, creating a culture for better technology evolution, and above all else supporting warfighters and increasing their lethality. […]

VA

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is requesting information for market research as it relates to testing software; infrastructure, environments, and operations of the Enterprise Testing Service (ETS) and ETS cloud; and continuous quality process management support. […]

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