By investing in tools that help automate processes, understand user behaviors and manage data and system access, agencies can equip users to securely support their missions.
By Chris Riotta
May 14, 2021
Responding to the surge in telework and corresponding demand for cloud services, the General Services Administration is considering a multiple-award blanket purchase agreement that would make cloud infrastructure, storage, software and services available to federal agencies and state, local and tribal governments.
The agency is conducting market research, asking for comments on developing an enterprisewide cloud-based acquisition strategy to deliver pay-as-you-go services from cloud service providers.
In a May 13 statement released on Thursday, GSA IT Category Deputy Assistant Commissioner Keith Nakasone said the top request his office receives from various agencies is for an acquisition solution that offers a full set of commercial, secure, soup-to-nuts, cloud products and services.
By GCN Staff
May 14, 2021
As the Defense Department weighs migrating legacy applications to programming languages that are more secure and easier to maintain, it must ensure automated solutions deliver the best chance of success to justify the migration costs.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is asking small businesses to submit proposals to its Lifting Legacy Code to Safer Languages program. LiLaCSL aims to not only develop tools and methodologies to migrate legacy C/C++ code to safer programming languages, but also ensure the code takes the fullest possible advantage of the target languages security features.
Today’s approaches for automating legacy code migration fail to leverage the native safety features of the target language, according to DARPA, and attempts to optimize built-in data structures of target languages often produces sub-optimal code.
By Jenni Bergal
May 14, 2021
A cybercriminal gang that breached the Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Police Department’s computer network in a ransomware attack published detailed information this week about nearly two dozen officers, including Social Security numbers and psychological assessments.
The group, Babuk, already had posted on the dark web lengthy dossiers of several officers. It claimed it stole more than 250 gigabytes of data late last month and is threatening to release more information as well as share files containing the names of confidential informants with criminal gangs if officials don’t pay a ransom.
The most recently posted documents contain sensitive information about 22 officers, such as fingerprints, dates of birth, polygraph test results and residential, financial and marriage history, according to NBC News. The hackers claim that they demanded $4 million in ransom and the department countered with $100,000, which they deemed unacceptable.