Ask the CIO

Chris DeRusha, the federal chief information security officer, said new FISMA metrics will ask agencies for more granular data on how they are meeting administration priorities. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

Paul Puckett, the former director of the Enterprise Cloud Management Agency (ECMA) in the Army’s CIO office, said the cloud is not only demonstrating value, but are also fundamentally changing the way that the Army looks at requirements, organizational alignment and incentive structures. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-n...

A group of former agency chief information officers and other technology executives is offering some specific suggestions for how to evolve the FITARA scorecard in a white paper from ACT-IAC. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

The Joint Financial Management Improvement Program (JFMIP) released a new payment integrity report and simulation tool to help agencies think differently about how to combat improper payments. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

David Shive, the chief information officer the General Services Administration, said data science, business analytics and the needs of the Public Buildings Service are among some of the upcoming opportunities under the GSA-wide IT services contract. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

The National Association of State CIOs (NASCIO) and Guidehouse released the 13th annual survey of state chief information officers and found similar challenges and opportunities as their federal brethren. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

Gharun Lacy, the deputy assistant secretary and assistant director for cyber and technology security at the Foreign Affairs Cybersecurity Center at the State Department, said reducing the time between alert and response is their main focus. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

The DoD’s CIO and its Office of Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment will remove weapons systems from the network if they are not cyber secure. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

Jamie Holcombe, the chief information officer for USPTO, said a new contract award will help the agency move toward a Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) architecture. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

Dr. David Markowitz, the Army’s chief data officer, said a streamlined and unified approach to the data platforms the service uses will enable senior leaders to make better, faster decisions. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

Chris DeRusha, the federal chief information security officer, said the focus on securing commercial software comes from the cyber executive order. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

The Defense Logistics Agency reached a major milestone on its cloud journey.  It recently completed the migration of its enterprise resource planning (ERP) system to the cloud. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

More than 100 agencies have signed on to extend their current set of telecommunications contracts for an additional year. The General Services Administration gave agencies until Sept. 30 to sign a memorandum of understanding to keep using the Networx and other programs while they transition to the Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions or EIS program. Gary Washington, USDA’s chief information officer...

The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency has a better understanding of where it’s cybersecurity shortcoming lie. To be clear, NGA recently passed several key audits required for its unclassified systems. But Gary Buchanan, the chief information security officer at NGA, said at a recent AFCEA DC panel these audits are actually helping the agency better protect their data and networks instead of...

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency is trying to lighten the ever-increasing load of policy mandates, laws and cyber threats agencies must deal with every day. From the zero trust strategy to the cybersecurity executive order, to the vulnerabilities like Log4j and the latest on five different VMware products, agency chief information security officers probably feel like they are swimming u...

Only in the last year has the 2019 Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act started to demonstrate a real impact on agency missions. As agencies updated their strategic plans for 2022, many used the law to drive better cross-agency conversations. For more, David Walters, the chief of strategic planning, performance management and reporting branch at the NASA Johnson Space Center; Harry Knig...

As the number of data centers continue to shrink year after year, agencies must make the hard decision about how best to optimize the remaining on-premise facilities. With another 54 planned closures in the final months of fiscal 2022, the 1,500 or so remaining are primed to advance their use of energy metering tools, server virtualization technologies and approaches to decrease the number of serv...

Where are all your assets on your network? That is the first question agency chief information security officers may want to ask on their journey toward a zero trust architecture. Shane Barney, the chief information security officer at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services in the Homeland Security Department spoke to Federal News Network Executive Editor Jason Miller on this week's Ask the...

When Keith Jones joined the State Department as its chief information officer in January 2021, he was surprised by the bureaucracy. Jones spent his entire federal career in working for the Justice Department or the Homeland Security Department and thought he’d knew how the system worked. Jones, who recently left after 17 months as the CIO of the State Department, said he tried cut through the bure...

The Baltimore Ravens football team may be better known for its winning ways on the field and its rabid fans in the stands. But the Social Security Administration turned to the NFL team because of its prowess in using data to drive customer experience decisions. It also didn’t hurt that SSA headquarters is located in Baltimore County, Maryland, and many of the staff are big fans of the team. Patric...

The Defense Department has been talking about the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) standards for more than three years. And while the final version 2.0 standards aren’t going to be ready until next summer, the impact of just talking about improving cybersecurity among contractors is real. Stacy Bostjanick, the chief of implementation and policy and deputy CIO for cybersecurity for...

The House of Representatives Chief Administrative Office is close to adding another shared service to the 100 or so it already provides. These range from acquisition support to human resources to finance and logistics. But the one area where those services were missing and sorely needed was around digital transformation. So in the coming months, the CAO will launch its new digital services office....

The impact of the Defense Innovation Unit shouldn’t be measured in the number of agreements awarded or the amount of dollars obligated. Both, by the way, are breaking new records each year. Rather, the impact of DIU should be measured in number of problems it helps solve for the Defense Department. Mike Madsen, the deputy director of Defense Innovation Unit, spoke to Federal News Network Executive...

For FEMA, cloud services are a lifeline to disaster survivors. There may be no better uses cases than when a hurricane or tornado strikes and FEMA must scale up its grants management or flood insurance program to tens of thousands of users in a matter of hours. Lytwaive Hutchinson, FEMA chief information officer; Greg Edwards, FEMA chief information security officer; Kevin Long, the insurance syst...

For the last few years, the IRS has been changing its external reputation and internal culture of an agency that doesn’t take technology risks. The Pilot IRS program may be one of the most well-known examples of this external evolution, reaching out to vendors to bring in innovation and new approaches to contracting. Internally, the use of robotics process automation in the procurement and financi...