Google Plus users can now add the White House to their circles as of Friday. In a Friday blog post, the White House announced that it has joined Google’s social networking service in addition to its active Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn accounts. The White House said joining Google Plus is part the administration’s efforts to [...]

The Defense Business Board believes Defense Department Chief Information Officer Teri Takai should have more authority over military and Pentagon agency CIOs, according to Federal Times. The board, consisting of private sector executives, recommended Takai have more authority to enforce policies for data center consolidation and cloud computing, according to the report. The board also called [...]

The  General Services Administration has taken another step in implementing FedRAMP by issuing new baseline security controls for federal agencies and cloud providers. The GSA included measures similar to those in a publication issued in August 2009 by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, according to FedScoop. Similar measures include using passwords 12 characters long [...]

The Department of Homeland Security is now poised to lead a Pentagon cyber defense project, according to a DHS privacy notice issued Friday. The pilot program was launched to test the effects of sharing classified information with defense contractors and their communications providers. Through the pilot, National Security Agency data was used to protect defense [...]

The Department of Homeland Security has named a new director of the National Cybersecurity division to replace Nicole Dean, who is leaving Jan. 22 for Raytheon, Federal News Radio reports.  FNR obtained an email indicating that the agency had named John Streufert to be director of the division and DHS confirmed the report. Streufert will start [...]

While there is guidance available for both the public and private sector for cybersecurity, the Government Accountability Office has decided that more could be done to promote the appropriate use of the current guidelines in place. The GAO issued a report outlining a study of private sector cybersecurity guidelines in seven areas including banking and finance, communications, [...]

The Energy Department and the Department of Homeland Security will work with electric companies to develop new cybersecurity measures to protect the nation’s energy grid, DOE announced Thursday. The initiative is part of the White House’s newly released “Electric Sector Cybersecurity Risk Management Maturity” project. “Establishing a comprehensive cybersecurity approach will give utility companies and [...]

In an effort to improve the “FCC online experience,” the Federal Communications Commission launched its public beta domain last week, where users can choose widgets and create a customized page. According to the announcement by FCC Managing Director David Robbins, MyFCC allows users to create a personalized page featuring the agency’s most used tools and services. [...]

For more than a year, Congress has been trying to hammer out spectrum legislation that includes funding for a national public safety network. In early December, House GOP leaders tacked on an approved version of spectrum legislation to the one-year extension of the payroll-tax cut, passed by the House last week. However in an 89-10 [...]

The government is taking strides toward implementing cloud first initiatives and in conjunction with FedRAMP, there is a big opportunity to get smart about consolidation, according to federal chief information officer Steven VanRoekel. VanRoekel made these comments at a Dec. 16 conference in Washington sponsored by ACT-IAC and the Association for Federal Information Resources Management. VanRoekel said [...]