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Bipartisan Bill Allows Government Contracts With Internet Providers to Support Conflict Zones
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Bipartisan Bill Allows Government Contracts With Internet Providers to Support Conflict Zones

Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., have introduced a new bill that would allow the federal government to provide commercial internet connectivity in conflict zones around the world.

Under the Safely Accessing Telecommunications Act, the Department of Defense and the State Department can contract with U.S. satellite cellular and internet providers in support of U.S. allies, according to a Tuesday post on Cornyn’s website.

The commercial services, which include end-point infrastructure such as satellite phones, could be used by affected governments to wage an information war and by civilians, first responders and essential services to remain connected with each other.

“Winning the war of public perception is a crucial part of armed conflict today, and as we’ve seen in Ukraine, the internet is the best way to gain support for your country’s cause globally,” explained Cornyn.

The legislation would will also “enable the U.S. government to collaborate with the private sector to help people living in conflict zones remain connected and protected against cyber-aggression,” explained Klobuchar.

Despite the authorization, the act would prohibit the agencies from forcing service providers to deliver connectivity against their will and from contracting with adversary-related entities on the Commerce Entity List.

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Maximus Names Liz Anthony as VP, Federal Market & Competition Strategy; Teresa Weipert Quoted
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Maximus Names Liz Anthony as VP, Federal Market & Competition Strategy; Teresa Weipert Quoted

Liz Anthony, two-decade marketing executive, has been named the vice president for Federal Market and Competition Strategy with Maximus, the government services provider announced on Thursday. 

“Maximus has grown exponentially in recent years, and we are thrilled to add Liz to our leadership team to help us reach that next level,” said Teresa Weipert, general manager for U.S. Federal Services with Maximus and a 2022 Wash100 Award recipient. 

“With her years of leadership experience, particularly in developing brand position and go-to-market strategies, Liz will be a valuable asset to further improve our standing as a federal technology and consulting leader,” Weipert added.

Anthony will be responsible for bolstering Maximus’ current growth initiatives and trajectory through its continued integration in their depth of expertise, technology and consulting. She will also lead the evolution of the Maximus brand to further expand Maximus offerings to federal agencies.

“Over the years, Maximus has established itself as a premier thought leader and innovator in the federal market,” Anthony explained. “With technology services and consulting to support our government and citizen relationships and a focus on ensuring the best customer experience, there is no limit to what we can achieve together in 2022 and beyond.”

Previously, Anthony has held a variety of marketing leadership positions over the course of her two decades of experience in the federal sector. Most recently, she was the senior vice president with ViON Corporation from April 2014 until her new role with Maximus. 

In addition, Anthony was the senior manager for the Global Public Sector with NetApp between Oct. 2011 and March 2014. She was the Public Sector Partner Marketing Manager for Cisco Systems for seven years as well. 

Liz Anthony is also currently a Board member with The Women’s Center and previously served as a Board member for Women in Defense (WID) DC.

“I am excited to join Maximus during this growth period, as the company expands its capabilities and reach with the addition of new technologies and new partnerships while leveraging its’ depth of agency expertise across the federal government,” Anthony explained. 

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Red Hat Public Sector VP, GM Clara Conti Talks Perseverance & Success With Potomac Officers Club
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Red Hat Public Sector VP, GM Clara Conti Talks Perseverance & Success With Potomac Officers Club

Red Hat’s public sector Vice President and General Manager, Clara Conti, a 20-year technology industry veteran who is also a 2022 Wash100 Award winner, was featured recently in an Executive Spotlight interview with the Potomac Officers Club to speak about her journey through the federal sector and the guiding principles that drive her personal and professional growth. 

In this excerpt from her interview, Conti shares insightful advice, informed by her deep industry expertise, for professionals looking to achieve success in their fields:

“I do not subscribe to ‘catching lightning in a bottle’ or ‘getting lucky.’ The effort you put in will reflect the true measure of your success. 

That success won’t necessarily happen overnight. This is something that everyone needs to understand, particularly women entering our field. There are a lot of women who enter the technology industry and drop out before they even have a chance to really build their careers. 

My advice is to keep coming onto the field—and stick with it! Rough patches will come, and they will challenge you. Ride them out. Follow through. Keep building those relationships. And be patient. Because perseverance will be noticed, and humility, curiosity and authenticity are innate and cannot be masqueraded. Keep in mind your customers deserve the best you have to offer, and you will be successful.”

Visit PotomacOfficersClub.com to read the full Executive Spotlight interview with Red Hat’s Clara Conti and to learn more about the platform’s membership options and benefits.

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Mandiant: APT 41 Group Targets US State Governments With Log4j Vulnerability
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Mandiant: APT 41 Group Targets US State Governments With Log4j Vulnerability

A group of hackers with links to the Chinese government compromised the computer networks in six U.S. state governments as part of a campaign that included the exploitation of internet-facing web applications and the use of the Log4j vulnerability, The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.

Cybersecurity firm Mandiant conducted investigations into the activity of the hacking group, called Advanced Persistent Threat 41, and found that the threat actors gained access to the computer systems of the state governments as part of the campaign that started in May 2021.

In February, two of the previously identified state governments were compromised again by the APT 41 group, according to researchers at Mandiant. They also found evidence of personal identifiable information being exfiltrated by the group.

“APT 41 continues to pose a significant threat to public and private organizations alike around the world,” said Geoff Ackerman, principal threat analyst at Mandiant. “We have found them everywhere, and that is unnerving.”

In December, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency urged federal civilian agencies to immediately patch the Log4j vulnerability.

The Department of Justice indicted five Chinese citizens in 2020 for alleged compromise of more than 100 companies in the U.S. and abroad. Federal prosecutors said those alleged threat actors were part of the APT 41 group and were linked to China’s state security ministry.

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SEC Proposes Cyber Risk, Incident Disclosure Requirements for Public Companies; Gary Gensler Quoted
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SEC Proposes Cyber Risk, Incident Disclosure Requirements for Public Companies; Gary Gensler Quoted

The Securities and Exchange Commission has proposed to amend its rules to improve and standardize disclosures by public companies regarding incident reporting, cybersecurity risk management, governance and strategy.

The proposal would require current reporting of material cyber incidents and periodic reporting to offer updates on previously reported attacks as well as direct periodic reporting of a registrant’s policies to manage cyber vulnerabilities and cyber risk oversight of the registrant’s board of directors, SEC said Wednesday.

SEC also proposed annual reporting requirements about the cyber expertise of the board of directors. Periodic reporting would also be required about the management’s role in cyber risk assessment and implementation of cyber policies.

“Today, cybersecurity is an emerging risk with which public issuers increasingly must contend. Investors want to know more about how issuers are managing those growing risks. … I think companies and investors alike would benefit if this information were required in a consistent, comparable, and decision-useful manner,” said SEC Chair Gary Gensler.

“I am pleased to support this proposal because, if adopted, it would strengthen investors’ ability to evaluate public companies’ cybersecurity practices and incident reporting,” Gensler added.

The proposed rules will be open for public comments once published in the Federal Register or on the commission’s website.

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House OKs $1.5T FY22 Omnibus Spending Package With Over $780B for Pentagon
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House OKs $1.5T FY22 Omnibus Spending Package With Over $780B for Pentagon

The House on Wednesday passed a $1.5 trillion budget package to fund the federal government through the end of September, The Hill reported.

The omnibus package would provide more than $780 billion for the Department of Defense and other defense initiatives and increase the Department of Homeland Security’s funding by 11 percent.

House lawmakers also approved by voice vote a continuing resolution that would run through March 15 to provide the Senate enough time to pass the omnibus bill and avoid a government shutdown. The current stopgap measure is set to expire Friday, March 11.

The package would allocate approximately $14 billion in emergency funds to support humanitarian, economic and security assistance to Ukraine and allies in central Europe amid the Russian invasion.

Mike McCord, the Pentagon’s comptroller, said DOD may require additional funding on top of current plans for fiscal year 2022 or FY 2023 if Lloyd Austin, secretary of DOD and a 2022 Wash100 Award recipient, orders further deployment of U.S. forces to back NATO allies in eastern Europe in light of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, according to a report by Breaking Defense.

“The funding that we requested …. was for the deployments the secretary has ordered to date,” said McCord, a previous Wash100 awardee. 

“So if the secretary orders more deployments or extends deployments, our costs will start to go up above what we projected. Now they don’t go up a lot, and obviously we have some other tools to deal with that by reprogramming. [But] if they go up a lot, and then we will probably come back [and ask for more money],” he added.

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Red Hat Platform Harnessed by Canadian Hospital Network to Modernize Data-Sharing
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Red Hat Platform Harnessed by Canadian Hospital Network to Modernize Data-Sharing

Software company Red Hat has provided data integration services for the largest network of hospital research centers in Canada, consolidating 170 systems into one platform.

Toronto’s University Health Network utilized the program Red Hat Integration to modernize its core hospital information system and create an accessible linkage between different data environments, the Raleigh, North Carolina-based company announced Tuesday.

Atif Chaughtai, senior director of Red Hat’s global healthcare business, explained that interoperability, empowered by programs like Red Hat Integration, is a key focus because it can help “drive down the cost of healthcare and improve patient outcomes.”

“Red Hat’s open source supported platform enables organizations such as University Health Network, to focus on delivering improved patient care and experiences,” Chaughtai continued.

UHN employed Red Hat Fuse, a function of Red Hat Integration, to streamline and strengthen data collection, delivery and scalability. The platform is reportedly able to unite legacy systems (such as the one UHN had previously), application programming interfaces and Internet of Things devices to establish a smooth-running network.

Red Hat’s efforts are aimed to allow patient records to be easily obtained yet still highly secure as the individual might be transferred to another department or facility. On the basis of security concerns, data is still stored within on-site servers, but UHN is said to be considering a move to Red Hat OpenShift, the company’s Kubernetes platform, to store data virtually in the future.

UHN also said they are eyeing artificial intelligence technologies as a future step to grow their information management and create efficient processes. This is in line with what Red Hat’s Clara Conti saw as an oncoming embrace of AI and machine learning in a recent interview with GovConWire.

“Over the past couple of years, AI and ML have advanced tremendously, often thanks to the elasticity of public clouds and GPU-enabled supercomputing…Open source AI and ML at the edge can make not only the impossible possible but they make the impossible possible faster,” Conti, a Wash100 Award winner, remarked.

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DLA Migrates Enterprise Resource Planning System to Cloud
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DLA Migrates Enterprise Resource Planning System to Cloud

The Defense Logistics Agency’s enterprise resource planning system underwent cloud migration in February, as part of a larger digital transformation strategy. 

DLA said Tuesday it expects the migration to provide cost advantages and enable new management capabilities as technology progresses.

“The original projected timeline was a 24-month effort, but the team was able to complete the migration in 16 months–eight months ahead of the original projected timeline,” said Stacey Evans, DLA’s ERP program manager.

She added that the migration allows DLA to harness module-based technology that employs blockchain, artificial intelligence and other emerging capabilities.

The ERP system manages almost 5.1 million line items for 25,000 military and civilian users. The system also supports more than 2,300 weapon systems, and on a daily basis, processes over 100,000 orders and 8,000 procurement actions.

The agency now begins the final phase of ERP migration, which involves adopting standard capability.

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Biden to Nominate MIT Professor Evelyn Wang for ARPA-E Director
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Biden to Nominate MIT Professor Evelyn Wang for ARPA-E Director

Preside Biden has announced plans to nominate Evelyn Wang, the head of the mechanical engineering department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, to be the director of the Advanced Research Project Agency-Energy at the Department of Energy.

Wang previously served as director of Solid-State Solar-Thermal Energy Conversion Center, one of DOE’s energy frontier research centers, and a member of the Defense Science Study Group advocating for increased participation of academia in national defense, the White House said Tuesday.

In a separate statement, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said Wang’s expertise and experience in the energy sector will solidify DOE’s effort to address climate change.

“Throughout Evelyn’s outstanding career, she has overseen groundbreaking research in heat-transfer technology that has advanced clean energy and clean water solutions,” Granholm said.

Wang has applied phase-change heat transfer to thermal management of electronics and devices for solar thermal energy conversion, water harvesting and desalination.

Mitre Expands Collaboration With Startup Ecosystem in Texas
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Mitre Expands Collaboration With Startup Ecosystem in Texas

Mitre has collaborated with Austin-based accelerator and early-stage investor Capital Factory to boost its engagement with the broader startup industry in Texas.

The company said Tuesday its newly opened regional innovation center in Austin will expand an ongoing partnership with Capital Factory through the latter’s Innovation Council to help local small businesses and startup companies connect with the federal marketplace.

“We look forward to continuing to mentor and help startups recognize the current and future innovation needs of the U.S. government and the robust opportunity the federal marketplace presents,” said Julie Gravallese, vice president for workplace innovation at Mitre.

Prior to the partnership, Mitre’s Bridging Innovation team have partnered with Capital Factory on a series of initiatives focusing on the defense innovation sector, including the virtual Fed Supernova Conference.

Mitre launched an iHub center in Austin iHub in 2021 to expand collaboration with universities, small businesses and the local community while continuing to boost work for the U.S. government.

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