Report: VA sent data over unsecured networks

Watchdog says VA sent sensitive patient data over unencrypted networks, posing security risk

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As agencies come to terms with cloud security, another barrier emerges

FedRAMP and other initiatives are helping CIOs become more comfortable with securing data and applications in the cloud. But changing the way agencies buy, manage and oversee technology is a bigger roadblock in moving systems to the cloud.

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Baker leaving VA a transformed IT organization

Roger Baker's last day as the Veterans Affairs Department's assistant secretary for information and technology and chief information officer is March 8. He said the agency manages and oversees IT much differently than it did four years ago.
March 7, 2013

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CIO Council harnessing growing list of 'world class' IT programs

The CIO Council will add 25 more examples of IT project management excellence to its best practice database. DHS CIO Richard Spires said at the Excellence.gov awards Tuesday the goal of all of these success stories is to share what worked and leave a broader legacy across all of Federal IT.

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Increased transparency at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

Mary Givvines, deputy director of Information Services at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, joins host John Gilroy to talk about how the agency's open government initiatives.
March 5, 2013

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Carrying On with Continuity of Operations

More than 80 percent of the federal systems count on private sector critical infrastructure to work.

Should one of the telecommunications, electricity or other providers be hacked or go down from a natural disaster, agency mission would be in peril.

Just take last summer's Derecho that impacted the Washington DC area. One agency lost their connection to the Internet for some time because of the storm even though their infrastructure was in the cloud.

Over the past decade or more, agencies have applied the lessons learned from the assortment of man-made and natural disasters that have impacted their services to keep their services running as smoothly as possible.

But with the emergence of cloud computing, virtualization, mobile computing and other technologies, what should agencies keep in mind to ensure the continuity of operations? How is the idea of COOP and disaster recovery changing? The panel, Carrying on with Continuity of Operations, will look at how agencies have implemented COOP and disaster recovery over the past decade and where they need to go next.

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Reimagining Government: Finding Opportunity in the Crisis

Looming budget cuts, expanded missions, greater public demand, and a changing workforce--huge challenges for today's government agency leaders. These challenges present opportunities to maximize value and do better with less. With guidance coming from many directions, how can leaders determine what works best for their agencies? What are the "game-changers" in the arena of driving value? And how can leaders expedite value optimization?

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Sequestration gives federal IT a crisis of confidence

Steven VanRoekel, the federal CIO, said the PortfolioStat approach will help agencies manage through these tough budget times. He said agency technology investments could take a hit as the automatic spending cuts become real.

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CIO ROUNDTABLE-Progress with IT Programs "Live from the 2013 AFCEA Homeland Security Conference" March 2013

Listen Tuesday March 5th @ 12pm
Program will discuss the following: Specific Programs That Are Making Great Progress,Top Priorities for Next 1-3 Years, Key Technology Trends, Biggest Challenges to Overcome, Biggest Opportunities for Collaboration, and Vision for The Future

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Hear David Robinson of SAP discuss Big Data

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IT reform bill needs to 'beef up' people section, experts say

Rep. Darrell Issa plans to formally introduce the Federal IT Acquisition Reform Act before the end of March. The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee held its second hearing on the draft bill. Current and former federal officials say the bill should place a stronger emphasis on project management and workforce issues.

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House committee worried DoD, VA 'moving the goal posts' on e-health records

A House Veterans Affairs Committee hearing on the decision by the Defense and Veterans Affairs Departments to scale back plans for a joint integrated electronic-health records systems dredged up longstanding issues with the two departments' EHR efforts.

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DoD's new plan promises speedy approval of commercial mobile devices

The Pentagon's commercial device implementation plan, made public Tuesday, aims at near-term implementation of a new generation of mobile devices such as iPhones, iPads and Android handhelds and tablets on both classified and unclassified networks.

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Mobile health: Can it save money for federal healthcare?

Kerry McDermott from the WestHealth Institute and Dr. Harry Greenspun from Deloitte talk about healthcare IT, and ways to cut costs.
February 26, 2013

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White House seeks to shed the risk-averse cyber information sharing culture

President Obama's recent executive order directing that cyber threat information be shared more broadly with the private sector risks making the data less useful to the intelligence agencies that gather and process it. But the risk is worth the potential reward.

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Inside the Reporter's Notebook: OPM personnel changes, Tangherlini gets more than 210 days

News and buzz in the acquisition and IT communities that you may have missed this week.

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Boehner says US veterans' claims system is broken

House speaker says system for veterans' disability claims is broken, cites 'shameful' failures

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NASA regains space station contact after outage

Space station crew can speak to Mission Control Houston after accidental communication loss

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GSA cancels 2013 Expo conference

Budget uncertainty at the General Services Administration, other agencies and among vendors is the main cause behind the decision to call off the annual training conference, GSA officials said.

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Private US firms take major role vs. cyberattacks

China hacking reveals outsourcing to private US firms in international cyberwar

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