The Department of Defense Office of the Inspector General wants to know the availability of commercial cloud services that are certified to store and process controlled unclassified information.

A sources sought notice posted Tuesday on SAM.gov says the OIG is interested in learning about the advantages of migrating key applications to a cloud environment in terms of security, cost, agility and scalability.

Specifically, the office is eyeing a cloud service offering that can handle Impact Level 5 DOD information and connect to the department’s Non-classified Internet Protocol Router Network.

Vendors responding to the request for information should describe their capacity to help the OIG safeguard information and isolate the office from other cloud tenants.

RFI responses are due July 19th.

FBI Director Christopher Wray and Ken McCallum, director-general of the U.K. security service MI5, have warned business leaders of China’s use of large-scale hacking and global network of intelligence agents to steal intellectual property of Western technology companies, The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.

“The Chinese government is set on stealing your technology—whatever it is that makes your industry tick—and using it to undercut your business and dominate your market,” Wray told business executives in London Wednesday. “They’re set on using every tool at their disposal to do it.”

Wray also expressed skepticism about commercial transactions with Chinese partners and said that business leaders should assess the risk of such interactions.

“Maintaining a technological edge may do more to increase a company’s value than would partnering with a Chinese company to sell into that huge Chinese market, only to find the Chinese government and your partner stealing and copying your innovation,” he said.

The U.S. National Counterintelligence and Security Center on Wednesday released a notice warning local and state government officials and business leaders about China’s use of overt and covert approaches to influence U.S. policymaking processes.

Some of the tactics China uses to influence policymaking are open lobbying, trade and investments to punish or reward officials and collection of personal data of state and local government leaders.

A team of U.S. Air Force acquisition staffers recommended measures for the military service to improve the coordination between its aircraft platforms and National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency information systems.

The Advanced Tactical Acquisition Corps found an interface issue between Air Force and NGA platforms is partly due to a configuration data management deficiency, the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center said Saturday.

“We developed a total of seven recommendations that improve the processes, tools, and resources for intelligence supportability in acquisition,” said Capt. Chris Bang, a member of ATAC-Team 12.

“Our desired end-goal is to allow acquisition leaders to make intel-informed decisions and deliver capabilities that provide our warfighters a tactical advantage.”

ATAC-Team 12 proposed recruiting more acquisition intelligence analysts to work at aircraft program offices and maintain a tracking database for geospatial systems.

The group also suggested codifying such positions into the Defense Acquisition Workforce Improvement Act and centralizing the GEOINT systems monitoring through a digital database.

Nine civilian and military employees make up the 12th cohort of ATAC, a three-month program that allows service personnel to identify possible approaches for addressing acquisition challenges.

A survey conducted by the Partnership for Public Service and Boston Consulting Group has found that government agencies that assessed how they recruit, hire and retain digital and data workforces got an average maturity score of 28 out of 100 across all six human capital categories and intend to improve their overall score by 39 points in the next five years.

The Federal Data and Digital Maturity Index survey conducted from September 2021 to February 2022 included responses to 20 questions about workforce recruitment and retention from over 100 representatives from six federal agencies as part of the human capital “deep dive,” the Partnership for Public Service said Friday.

Of the six human capital categories, the agencies had the lowest current maturity score in the area of organizational transformation at 25 out of 100 points. This category assesses how thoroughly and frequently employees with digital and data expertise are involved in an agency’s projects.

Agencies reached a maturity score of 30 out of 100 in the leadership and cultural change category, which evaluates how organizations build up the leadership of their data and digital workforce and promote inclusion and diversity.

“These survey results show that agencies across government should focus on building an effective data and digital workforce to modernize their operations, improve decision-making and more effectively serve the public,” the report reads.

Other human capital categories assessed in the survey were people strategy; talent acquisition; people development; and performance, reward and engagement.