Government Shutdown? Some Federal IT Systems Would be Unplugged, Websites Go Offline

Judging by the last government shutdown two years ago, if Congress can’t agree on a deal to fund the federal government by Sept. 30, national parks will be shuttered, thousands of federal employees will be forced to stay home -- and some parts of the government’s digital presence will unplugged as well.

The last time the federal government shut down -- for 16 days in 2013 -- agencies were ordered to power down nonessential IT systems. Many public-facing websites went dark or were not updated and the scroll of tweets from agency accounts slowed to a crawl.

Facing another partisan funding impasse this year, agencies have put together updated shutdown plans, and the White House is currently reviewing them as preparation for the possibility of “executing an orderly shutdown.”

Details of agencies’ plans haven’t been made public, but it’s worth revisiting a detailed September 2013 memo from the Office of Management and Budget on how agencies should handle tech matters if the government goes into shutdown mode.

In general, only IT systems that “must operate to avoid significant damage to the execution of authorized or excepted activities,” such as national security, should remain in operation, and only at the minimum level “necessary to maintain functionality and ensure the security and integrity of the system during the period of the lapse,” the guidance stated.

According to the guidance, the same goes for agency websites. And depending on how interconnected they are with essential back-end systems, “agencies must determine whether the entire website can be shut down or components of the website will be shut down,” the guidance stated.

Some websites went dark entirely in 2013, while others carried messages informing visitors they weren’t being updated regularly.

What about cybersecurity?

When political wrangling earlier this year led to the possibility of a partial shutdown at the Department of Homeland Security, agency officials warned lawmakers the funding lapse would delay task orders under the multibillion Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation program, which provides a suite of automated tools and services for spotting cyber vulnerabilities. (During the 2013 governmentwide shutdown, DHS halted work orders on the project).

However, this go-around, DHS is in a better position. Just ahead of the Sept. 30 funding deadline, DHS awarded three new orders under the CDM program, making the continuous-monitoring tools available to 17 additional federal agencies.

The program now covers 97 percent of agencies, fulfilling a promise DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson made to lawmakers this summer to extend cyber protections in the wake of the massive hack of Office of Personnel Management records.

Nearly all of DHS’ cyber employees would remain on the job in the event of a shutdown. Overall, about 85 of DHS’ workforce was exempt from furloughs during the 2013 shutdown.