The Office of Management and Budget’s IT management reform was the talk of the town last month – at least among federal tech circles. But, as the chatter and the buzz dies down, the next step is acting on some of the plan’s provisions, including the plan’s cloud-first strategy. In an interview with Federal News [...]

As electric companies make increasing gains to modernize the power grid, some have raised the concern of a malicious hacker breaking into the smart grid and wreaking havoc. With that in mind, the Government Accountability Office issued a report this month, assessing the cybersecurity issues that continue to afflict the smart grid and asking whether [...]

The Defense Department recently scaled down plans to withhold a percentage of payment if a contractor supplies a deficient business system. The original rule change, which would apply to internal company controls, such as accounting measures, had drawn significant outcry from industry circles and the amendment appeared to assuage critics of the original proposal. However, [...]

It’s not Fort Knox, but the Treasury Department will move its main public website and four of its agency websites to the cloud. The Washington Post‘s technology blog Post Tech reports Amazon Web Services will host Treasury’s recently renovated websites and Smartronix, which built the new site, will help lead the migration. According to a [...]

Defense Department employees must be prepared to provide a cost estimate any time they want to use the company credit card, so to speak. According to a DoD memo from Defense Secretary Robert Gates late last month, by Feb. 1,  all defense agencies and the military branches must use an online cost-assessment tool to estimate [...]

As skirmishes over the upcoming 2012 budget are expected to switch into high gear over the next few weeks, health IT coordinator David Blumenthal laid out the guidelines agencies must follow for health IT investments. Blumenthal, along with federal Chief Information Officer Vivek Kundra developed the guidelines, consisting of five key “policy and technology principles” [...]

Beth Noveck, deputy chief technology officer and director of the Open Government Initiative will follow her colleague Andrew McLaughlin out the door of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. Noveck, the author of Wiki Government, a tome on social media and democracy, will return to teaching law at New York Law School, [...]

A bill proposed in the House of Representatives last week would add another year to the two-year federal pay freeze, reduce the federal workforce by 10 percent and cut Defense Department procurement by 15 percent. Rep. Kevin Brady (R-Texas) introduced the “Cut Unsustainable and Top-heavy Spending,”  last week, saying the Congress needs to take “strong [...]

The big news last week for the government-contracting community was the update Defense Secretary Robert Gates provided on the Pentagon efficiencies. But, along with his familiar refrain, voicing support for the $100 billion in cost savings, he also announced an additional $78 billion in budget cuts, including the cancellation of some weapons systems. “Not every [...]

While the military faces broad public support, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen called for reflection and self-examination, amid some fears the military is growing out of touch. At a leadership conference at the National Defense University at Fort McNair in Washington, D.C., Mullen said the Defense Department must “begin a [...]