The Spectrum IT Modernization Act, which advanced on a voice vote out of the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee on May 20, takes aim at revamping the way the Federal government manages the airwaves. […]
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Terry Halvorsen
The Department of Defense (DoD) would like to get rid of the Common Access Card (CAC), but the problem–finding a suitable replacement. It turns out that the replacement won’t be one thing, but multiple biometric identifiers that combine to make out a person’s identity. […]
For IT acquisitions professionals in the Department of Defense, Buy American provisions can do far more harm than good, according to former DoD officials testifying in front of the House Armed Services Committee. […]
The Defense Department is likely within 18 months of introducing autonomous cybersecurity tools that will be capable of augmenting human analysts by predicting threats and dynamically isolating parts of the network that may come under attack, outgoing CIO Terry Halvorsen said. […]
Though lessons learned from the Office of Personnel Management data breach have resulted in many improvements in cybersecurity practices, the 2015 breach and subsequent cyber incidents led members at a House Oversight Committee hearing to question the pace of Federal data protection efforts. “Right now it is an uphill fight,” said Department of Defense CIO Terry Halvorsen. […]
The Department of Defense’s decision to move to Windows 10 remains solid. As Microsoft’s most secure operating system ever deployed, Windows 10 offers significant security features baked right in. What’s slowing the effort at many agencies, however, is the actual migration process–it’s time-consuming, expensive, and unattainable within a year’s time frame. It doesn’t have to be, says Mike Wilkerson of VMware. […]
The White House Office of Personnel Management announced that Charles S. Phalen Jr. will be the director of the National Background Investigations Bureau starting Oct. 1. […]
Data Center Closures and Cloud Key to Pentagons Future IT Environment If the Department of Defense were a private corporation, it would sit at the top of the Fortune 100, a behemoth with more than 2 million employees spread across 5,000 locations and a $36 billion annual IT budget. But it would still be wrestling […]
In the Defense Department’s new strategy document outlining the department’s vision for its future IT environment, CIO Terry Halvorsen argues the complex enterprise network is too difficult to defend, too costly to operate and maintain, and hampers effective information sharing between the military services and the nation’s allies. The strategy outlines eight major goals. […]
The Office of Personnel Management announced today that it has hired Dave DeVries, the principal deputy chief information officer at the Defense Department, to become the agency’s next permanent CIO. […]
In a guest commentary, Richard Beutel at Cyrrus Analytics says the Federal government needs the IT Modernization Fund to be used as seed corn to accelerate the agencies off of fossil computers. […]
Politics and blame stand in the way of Federal IT modernization, according to comments made at the House Oversight Committee’s hearing on legacy IT systems. Congressmen said they were disappointed and baffled over the degree of outdated technology in Federal agencies, some in mission critical systems. […]
NASA landed its newest spacecraft—the Starship Incredulity—at the Rayburn House Office Building and NASA CIO Renee Wynn had the audacity to report that not a single investment in the agency’s planned $731 million in technology programs is high risk….Get ready for another round of hard-hitting congressional questioning, this time about the government’s addiction to legacy IT systems that continue to drain billions of dollars of taxpayer money away from new investments and modernization accounts. […]
Remember that $7 billion Congress allocated to help establish a nationwide public safety broadband network, known as FirstNet? Well, when was the last time 50 states agreed on anything?…VA might be getting a new deputy assistant secretary for cybersecurity….If Congress eliminates polygraphs for security clearance holders, the result could be new business for the IT industry. […]
Catch up on some reading this weekend. Here are a few interesting items from around the Web. […]
The Defense Department likes to hit its targets. So you can imagine the frustration that the department’s chief information officer, Terry Halvorsen, must have experienced when he realized that he wasn’t even going to come close to reaching the Federal mandate to close at least 40 percent of the department’s data centers by 2015. […]
To dig deeper into the many factors that have contributed to the current state of affairs in the Federal Data Center Consolidation Initiative, MeriTalk spoke with some of the leading agency authorities about the many data center challenges facing chief information officers, and the plans and policies that hold the most promise of helping the government achieve its data center consolidation goals. […]
The Department of Defense is ready to upgrade all Windows-based legacy systems to Windows 10 by January 2017. Nearly three months after Chief Information Officer Terry Halvorsen issued a new policy requiring the upgrade, a verbal execution order has gone out that puts the unprecedented migration effort into motion. […]