Modernization

DISA director: Industry has a role in Pentagon cloud

While the Snowden and Manning leaks may have underlined the importance of the Joint Information Environment, it is unclear if they accelerated the timetable for completion.

Cybersecurity

Lockheed looks to open standards

The standardized software is intended to boost the sharing of cyber-threat information through automation.

Modernization

Study: Pentagon needs strategic approach to UAVs

A Center for Strategic and International Studies report notes decreased R&D spending at the same time several other countries are gearing up their own drone programs.

Cybersecurity

Defense authorization bill boosts cybersecurity

A House panel’s version of the annual defense policy measure would authorize increased cyber funding and require the administration to report back to Congress on a range of IT-related issues.

People

Q&A with Rep. Mac Thornberry

The Texas Republican tasked with overhauling DOD acquisition talked with FCW about his concerns and priorities.

Cybersecurity

Sending cyber sense down the Navy chain of command

“Pockets of non-understanding” still plague the lower echelons of the Navy hierarchy when it comes to cybersecurity, says Vice Adm. Jan Tighe.

Acquisition

Balderson to lead Northrop Grumman contracting

Diane Balderson was most recently head of contracting for the Naval Air Systems Command.

Cybersecurity

Lawmaker voices concern about possible DIA nominee

California Republican Rep. Duncan Hunter takes issue with Lt. Gen. Mary Legere’s handling of the Army's Distributed Common Ground System.

Modernization

Army personnel database picks up where Pentagon left off

The Army's new pay and personnel system grew out of DoD's decision to cancel a department-wide database that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs called a disaster.

People

Linking research to real life (and to real-world budgets)

With a doctorate in neuroscience and a talent for finding funding, Ivy Estabrooke personifies the Office of Naval Research's straddling of science and military operations.

Acquisition

Pentagon ponders making IT subject to same rules as weapons

Defense Undersecretary Frank Kendall and Sen. Joe Donnelly used an Armed Services Committee hearing to discuss the possibility of using the same cost guidelines for IT and weapons systems.

People

Pentagon: IT departures won't disrupt relations with industry

A DOD spokesman said there was no timetable for replacing outgoing CIO Teri Takai.

Cybersecurity

DOE releases cyber procurement guidelines

The nonbinding rules are aimed at reducing vulnerabilities in the power sector's procurement process.

Digital Government

Takai to leave DOD

CIO's May departure will add to the Pentagon's growing list of senior IT and management vacancies.

Cybersecurity

Commerce bureaus flunk cyber test

The department's inspector general used automated software to direct suspicious traffic at the public-facing websites of five offices; only one analyzed and moved to block the threat.

Acquisition

Improved Pentagon acquisition requires tolerance of risk

Overhauling the defense acquisition process is a national security imperative in tight budget times, argues a consultant and former Marine major general.

Digital Government

INSCOM points toward greater use of open standards

The Intelligence and Security Command is the Army’s one-stop-shop for intelligence, and the platform for its recently deployed geospatial database runs on non-proprietary technology.

Modernization

TASC taps ‘first federal CIO’

Mark Forman joins the defense contractor as vice president for IT services and cloud initiatives.

Cybersecurity

Increased trust boosts Pentagon-industry info sharing

In the seven years since the creation of the Defense Industrial Base Cybersecurity Information Assurance program, contractors have become less skittish about what sharing can do to their bottom lines, a Pentagon official says.