Cybersecurity has always contended with evolving threats. As the internet has become more embedded into social and economic life and smart phones, tablets and other handheld devices become ubiquitous, bad actors have devised new attacks to capitalize on new vulnerabilities. And just as agencies are implementing zero trust architecture to help with this wave, other IT developments are threatening to upend cybersecurity even more. For instance,...

Cybersecurity has always contended with evolving threats. As the internet has become more embedded into social and economic life and smart phones, tablets and other handheld devices become ubiquitous, bad actors have devised new attacks to capitalize on new vulnerabilities. And just as agencies are implementing zero trust architecture to help with this wave, other IT developments are threatening to upend cybersecurity even more. For instance,...

Machine learning and artificial intelligence already are playing a significant role in reworking call centers, in government agencies and private industry alike. Just picture the chatbots that show up every time you go to the online portal for the Department of Motor Vehicles, for instance, and get prompted to renew your auto registration online. To date, call center agents and customers both prefer human interaction. As generative AI (genAI)...

Events on the world stage are also playing out in cyberspace. Nation-states continue their kinetic wars into internet realms, commit crimes such as financial and intellectual property theft, and pursue their global strategic goals hidden from view. Ransomware attacks are increasing again. It’s a tough time for cybersecurity professionals. “We’re seeing attackers cause bigger impacts with less skills. They’re also more b...

The cybersecurity slogan for zero trust is a simple one: Never trust, always verify. This slogan fits into the Department of Defense mindset, which is always focused on how to reduce risk, but it’s a challenge to apply it to the federal government’s largest agency. An important tool in pursuing zero trust is to implement microsegmentation – partitioning a network into small, isolated sections to reduce the attack surface in e...

The federal government has been proactive in continuity of operations (COOP ) planning since at least the 1950s, when President Eisenhower issued executive orders directing various measures agencies should take to be prepared for a possible nuclear war. The need for COOP leads naturally to the question of resilience – how quickly agencies can recover from events beyond their control. Climate change is a slow-moving tsunami of many smalle...

Many government agencies wrestle with their legacy systems and outdated processes every day, especially when it comes to cybersecurity and data flow. Agencies usually have multiple servers, private or hybrid clouds, and thousands of end points, from desktop computers to smart phones, tablets to sensors, generating millions of bits of data. An army of data analysts wouldn’t be able to keep up with the volume of logs being generated (and n...

It is hard to believe that ChatGPT isn’t even a year old yet, when you look at the tidal wave of new apps that have been released in its wake. After decades where the phrase “artificial intelligence” was sufficient, commentary in the public sphere has already moved to the next level – generative AI. What’s the difference? As Forbes describes it, “Traditional AI systems are primarily used to analyze data and...

We all now live in a data-driven world. And the federal government may be the single largest generator – and user – of data in the world. According to Digital.gov, “Every day, thousands of federal workers collect, create, analyze, and distribute massive amounts of data from weather forecasts to economic indicators to health statistics. Federal government data is a major driver of the American economy as businesses use the dat...

Advances in telecommunications capabilities are a major driver in Department of Defense programs. From creating secure private networks that U.S. military forces and their partners can use in conflicts to integrating 5G capabilities to create “smart” warehouses to significant improvements in supply chain logistics, DoD has been committed to investing in rethinking the meaning and applications of communications. One of the next step...