Not since the Truman administration more than 60 years ago has a U.S. president decided to overhaul how the federal government manages its records.
But according to records management experts, newly emerging technologies will likely be needed in order for agencies to meet the president’s policy goals. Keep reading →
Procurement is emerging as one of the most significant issues facing federal information technology leaders as the Obama administration begins its second term, a top ranking government IT official said this week.
More and more federal agencies are making the leap to cloud computing, adopting mobile technologies and developing APIs to share information. But agency IT leaders remain hampered from moving faster by contracting constraints that make it hard to make cross-agency buys, said Richard Spires, chief information officer for the Department of Homeland Security and vice chairman of the Federal CIO Council. Keep reading →
With the “fiscal cliff” closely looming on the horizon, the post-election honeymoon is over for President Barack Obama. Both parties must work to avert the pending spending cuts and tax hikes that will take place should a compromise not be reached by December 31.
Reuters recently reported that a compromise is being negotiated between the Obama administration and congressional leaders that would key in on a deficit reduction package in Congress’ January session. This comes after President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) discussed the matter last Friday, stating they are ready to work together on an agreement, including the possibility of listening to new ideas to get a deal done. Keep reading →
While President Obama prepares to tackle the looming fiscal showdown with Congress and fine tune his policy objectives for his second term, he must also prepare to retool his Cabinet and his core White House team.
The Obama administration has had one of the lowest Cabinet turnover rates in history. But as with most second-term presidents, a number of Cabinet-level officials and those with Cabinet rank, have already announced or indicated their intent to leave as President Obama begins his second term. Keep reading →
Commercial industry needs to step up and share more information about cyber attacks on its networks with Federal agencies responsible for cyber defense government officials said at a cybersecurity event in Washington this week.
Cyber attacks are showing increasing sophistication across the board – from basement hackers to foreign intelligence agencies, said Sean Kanuck, national intelligence officer for the National Intelligence Council during a daylong INSA Cyber Innovation Symposium Sept. 26. Keep reading →
The Obama Administration is pushing ahead with a series of cybersecurity initiatives to protect critical national infrastructure from attack. At the heart of the process are a series of steps designed to improve how government networks detect and deter intruders, report incidents and work with local and international law enforcement to imprison cyber criminals.
Michael Daniel, special assistant to the president and White House cybersecurity coordinator, explained White House priorities for cybersecurity today at the INSA Cyber Innovation Symposium in Washington, DC. They include: securing federal networks, protecting critical infrastrucure, cyber reporting and response, cyber intelligence, and international engagement. Keep reading →
The race to meet a series of milestones for advancing federal mobility continues to encounter differing expectations and the underlying need for better methods for managing data, according to a group of federal IT leaders in the throes of delivering the Obama Administration’s Digital Government Strategy.
In a White House report issued last month, Administration officials listed a variety of accomplishments in the first 90 days of a year-long set of initiatives, declaring “agencies are making great strides towards putting a solid foundation for a 21st Century Digital Government in place.” Keep reading →
It’s been a year since the Obama Administration launched a major veteran hiring initiative calling on private industry to partner in an effort to secure employment for military families.
The effort — which has involved the Department of Veterans Affairs and the expanding role of IT in federal agencies — has since resulted in job opportunities for more than 125,000 veterans and their spouses. Keep reading →
The scrutiny over what federal employees spend to attend work-related conferences has continued to escalate after a recent salvo of letters to the secretaries of the Departments of Defense, Agriculture, Education, Health and Human Services and other agencies.
The letters, from Congressman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee he chairs, ask for a detailed accounting of travel spending in connection with 150 conferences. After analyzing “thousands of documents,” the committee concluded that the General Services Administration was hardly alone when, in 2010, it permitted employees to spend an average of $600 per day per employee to attend an over-the-top regional training conference in Las Vegas. Keep reading →
In one of his first public appearances since being officially named CIO at the Department of Energy, Robert Brese called for greater efforts to develop a skilled cybersecurity workforce, and stressed the importance of responding to cyber threats, not merely being prepared to prevent and recover from them.
In a series of wide-ranging remarks on the state of cybersecurity in the federal government, Brese highlighted six factors shaping the evolution of federal cybersecurity policy, but concluded that despite many challenges, the federal government is “doing a better job than a majority of the private sector” in defending its networks. Keep reading →