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Industry Consortium Aims to Stop Procurement of Counterfeit Tech; Andras Szakal Comments

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Andras-SzakalIndustry consortium Open Group has unveiled a benchmark for accrediting global information technology partners in a bid to implement best practices across the industry, according to a GSN article.

The group intends to help federal agencies ensure that products to purchase are genuine and do not contain hidden components, William Jackson writes.

Andras Szakal, chief technology officer at IBM U.S. Federal and a member of The Open Group’s Trusted Technology Forum, said the standard provides criteria that builds on the best practices of the IT industry.

“The federal government is very concerned about products that could have tainted or maliciously inserted components,” said Szakal.

OpenHe noted the military has encountered few incidents where products acquired by contractors stopped working soon after purchase because they were counterfeit.

The Open Group spent a number of years working on standards with several agencies, including the Defense Department and NASA.

For example, the open trusted technology provider standard kicked off in 2009 when government officials had met with industry representatives and asked for a process to determine trusted IT services providers, according to forum director Sally Long.

Long expects designated third-party laboratories to conduct the certification within a year while the first version of O-TTPS is in its initial stage.

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