As part of its risk mitigation strategy, the Cybersecurity Executive Order issued by the White House in May moves Zero Trust architecture to the center of cyber hygiene policy for the federal government. Zero Trust can be summarized easily: Trust nothing, suspect everything, authenticate 100%. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency views this as setting an example for state and local governments looking to strengthen their securi...

The Continuous Diagnostic and Mitigation (CDM) program has matured and broadened its offerings and full deployment of agency dashboards is on the horizon. In the last year, however, ominous high profile breaches in commercial and critical infrastructure networks have highlighted the continued importance of strong cybersecurity across federal networks. In the wake of the pandemic, federal IT managers are faced with an increasingly complex cyber...

Governments everywhere and at all levels should be applauded for finding ways to meet their citizens’ needs during the pandemic. While many agencies had continuity-of-operations plans in place, no one imagined that every agency would have to act on them at the same time. What made it possible, of course, was the rapid spread of cloud-based technology that enabled government employees to work from their own homes, frequently using their o...

Time and time again, data breaches demonstrate the pitfalls of relying on detection to identify malicious activities taking place on the network, rather than prevention of the threat in the first place. The emphasis—post event—has been what the agency did wrong. But, what if we took a different approach that allowed agencies to share what has been working for them? Both before and after. Some tips and lessons from folks who have be...

In the iconic “Star Trek” – whether the TV series of the 1960s or the two-movie adaptations over the past 40 (!) years – Dr. McCoy uses a handheld scanner to examine, diagnose, and treat his patients. What “Star Trek” doesn’t show is the vast amount of machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) that culminated in the creation of the scanner’s capabilities. Though this level of compute...

The pandemic and great resignation have put talent acquisition and employee retainment front and center for companies and federal agencies alike. Today, there are several emerging technologies that can make a substantial impact on improving recruitment, reducing regrettable attrition, and promoting diversity and inclusion. At the forefront of this innovation is Artificial Intelligence (AI). Yet misconceptions, misunderstandings, and a lack of...

"How to prevent and detect corporate fraud!!" Under COSO 2013, Principle 8: "The organization considers the potential for fraud in assessing risks to the achievement of objectives". Corporate fraud is more prevalent today than ever before. Layoffs, pressures, incentives, anonymity, computerization, and lack of privacy are all contributing factors. This CPE event is focused on presenting the internal controls to fraud prevention and detection....

In just a few short years, Robotic Process Automation has gone from a few scattered pilot projects to an essential tool deployed by dozens of agencies. Hundreds of thousands of staff-hours have been saved, and organizations are increasingly looking to leverage artificial intelligence to automate more-complicated workflows. Automation at scale comes with challenges, however -- from credential management to siloed systems to ensuring that outdat...

George Bernard Shaw famously once said that England and America are two countries separated by a common language. In the digital domain, however, zeros and ones transcend that difference. In diplomatic circles, the U.S. and the U.K. are known to have a closely aligned relationship. That extends to the military, as well - both are pursuing digital transformation strategies to facilitate adoption of emerging, innovative technologies, such as art...

Digital transformation across government has led to vast improvements in the quality of services delivered to Americans nationwide and has helped provide special assistance amidst the pandemic. Hear from federal technology executives on how their agencies are implementing new digital services and expanding their capacities to provide the best user experience for millions of U.S. citizens.