Most government agencies have made the journey to cloud since the Cloud First and Cloud Smart strategies came from OMB starting in 2010. Many organizations have more than one cloud. The challenge becomes blending the different types of cloud and service models to provide access to needed data, while at the same time protecting a much enlarged attack surface created by the large number of workers who are accessing the data remotely. If there is...

As the pandemic closed shops and business, many people lost jobs and applied for unemployment. Record numbers of calls starting flooding unemployment offices. The Internal Revenue Service started getting a torrent of calls and inquiries about larger federal unemployment benefits. Agencies throughout the government have been working to provide information and fast responses in an always on digital world. New cloud communications platforms can d...

The Federal Data Strategy's action plan was reworked in response to the COVID-19 crisis, while state and local governments are simultaneously expanding health data initiatives and looking for more cost-effective data solutions. Add in the growing importance of data-intensive cyber threat detection and the broad potential of AI and automation, and it becomes clear: Agencies' data challenges are evolving rapidly, and a solid data strategy is mis...

Emerging technologies offer the promise of better, faster, cheaper processing and problem solving, but they also bring the possibility of bias, security breaches and new privacy issues. Most agencies are experimenting on a small scale and testing out standards on privacy and security. Workforce also has been a concern as emerging tech matures—both to ensure displaced workers are reskilled and to make certain the job classifications are a...

Whether it's delivering better care for veterans, improving the citizen experience on federal websites or reimagining business processes within an agency, digital transformation is essential to making government run better. Both the President's Management Agenda and the 21st Century IDEA Act have underscored the importance of these efforts, but the real proof is in the specific projects underway across the federal community. The 2020 Federal 1...

Much as technology is now woven into virtually every aspect of government, cybersecurity must now be an essential element of every federal IT system and initiative. From continuous monitoring of agency systems to securing the supply chain to ensuring military superiority in the electronic domain, cyber has become both critical and ubiquitous. The list of 2020 Federal 100 winners illustrates both the vast range and vital importance of today's c...

Office 365 is an incredibly powerful tool for boosting productivity and facilitating collaboration, but ensuring secure agency collaboration becomes a bit more complicated when it comes to managing guest users and external sharing.Controls must be configured correctly and out-of-the-box functionality is one-size-fits-all within the tenant. Agencies must ask themselves the following important questions: How do I enforce external sharing policie...

Software Defined Wide Area Networks (SD-WAN) have been very successful as an enterprise solution in the commercial world, but security concerns and the government’s former emphasis on working in offices has slowed its deployment in the public sector. Now, however, with large parts of the federal workforce working remotely, demand for access to the public internet has dramatically increased. Release of new interim guidance about TIC 3.0 a...

In the decade since "Cloud First" debuted as a formal goal of government, federal agencies have made tremendous progress in transforming both their IT infrastructure and modernization strategies. But as the (relatively) easy migrations have been made, the remaining systems and workloads require decidedly more complex approaches. The 2020 Federal 100 winners include experts in all aspects of "Cloud Smart" modernization, from security to scalabi...

Improving the customer experience has been a federal focal point for several years now, but many organizations still struggle with turning basic goals like "better design" and "meet digital natives' expectations" into a practical program to improve CX. In this GCN editorial webcast, GCN editors will speak with CX experts within government about what's worked for them, and how to make sure CX investments pay dividends across the enterprise. Thi...