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U.S. government agencies are looking everywhere they can to cut costs -- including the cost of information technology. Tight budgets will be the dominating factor in federal IT procurement over the next several years -- at least. Yet in the face of budget discipline -- and even slightly projected de...

The U.S. government's pursuit of cloud-based technology has been characterized by a blizzard of policies, directives, technical studies, proposed contract vehicles and conferences. The federal "cloud first" initiative, requiring agencies to give priority consideration to cloud solutions for IT opera...

The U.S. government is learning quickly that achieving the next big thing in information technology depends upon implementing a huge number of little things. For federal IT managers, that big thing is the cloud. Federal agencies have busily pursued cloud solutions since December 2010, when the gover...

E-Commerce buzz words sound great in theory, but innovation often founders on the shoals of "getting there from here" as IT managers slog through the details of converting to new systems and programs. Federal agencies have been turning to shared services, data consolidation, commodity IT and, especi...

President Obama initiated an Open Government program on his second day in office, pledging to make government information more accessible to the public. Three years later, that program has achieved significant success in many forums. However, the effort of making more federal information even more a...

Information technology vendors seeking business from the federal government are well advised to keep an eye on the requirements of big agencies such as the Department of Justice or the Department of Homeland Security. Within big departments, there are big components -- such as the Food and Drug Admi...

When the U.S. government goes to the market for information technology, various contracting mechanisms come into play. In fact, as IT evolves, contracting follows, witness recent efforts at the General Services Administration to develop special procurement vehicles for both cloud technology and wire...

Competing for federal contracts is tough -- and protesting the award of a federal contract may be even tougher. But a ruling by a federal agency appears to have improved the ability of all vendors -- not just IT firms -- to utilize key legal channels for protesting the award of federal contracts. On...

The mushrooming use of wireless devices by the general public has spilled over to the federal government as agencies try to match their employees' personal use of mobile equipment with similar devices for use on the job. An emerging issue in federal mobile media use is that there is no overall gover...

Protecting sensitive information in the electronic age is a critical matter -- but the question of what the term "critical" really means has become a vexing problem for lawmakers dealing with cybersecurity issues. Equally challenging is defining the role that government should play in protecting all...

Thousands of federal employees will be using cloud-based email systems as government agencies take their first steps in meeting a mandate to inaugurate cloud services within their information technology systems. The White House has directed 25 large agencies to launch at least one cloud-migration pr...

Federal chief information officers appear to be heeding the unofficial Missouri state slogan: "I'm from Missouri -- Show Me." In a challenging time for procurement of IT systems and services, CIOs are trying to adopt improved methods for acquiring and managing information resources. In a recent surv...

Information technology providers and politicians on both sides of the aisle are applauding the Obama administration for wading into the complex issue of cybersecurity. The administration issued its package of Internet security legislative proposals last week, spurring hopes that the U.S. Congress wo...

Vendors seeking to provide cloud-based information technology to federal agencies now have some idea of the potential market for their offerings. The General Services Administration has asked vendors to submit bid and qualification information that could lead to their selection as contractors for e...

A key element in the shifting political winds in Washington is a call for less business regulation, especially from the conservative wing of the now ascendant Republican majority in the U.S. House of Representatives. But one leading Republican last week tossed that mantra aside and launched into a t...

The Obama administration has come up with a proposal for both improving and simplifying identity protection for consumers using the Internet, computers, and mobile devices. The plan would greatly reduce the need for consumers to use and remember multiple passwords or fill out separate privacy forms ...

The budget deal worked out between the White House and Congress for the 2011 fiscal year will directly impact the federal e-government program. The spending agreement will put a severe crimp in a program that bolsters government transparency efforts, as well as initiatives designed to modernize IT m...

In the competitive federal information technology market, Google thought it was a good idea to challenge the U.S. Interior Department on a potentially rich procurement for hosted messaging services. Google claimed that Interior failed to observe government contracting policies by focusing on Microso...

Vendors competing for federal information technology contracts are required to meet a broad array of standards reflected in much of industry jargon, such as cybersecurity, interoperability and scalability. Technical factors are critical, of course. At a Senate hearing last week, however, it became c...

Government reform initiatives are frequently long on saying, and short on doing. White papers and strategic plans are the stuff of good intentions, but actual implementation is often elusive. The ambitious goal of the Obama administration to improve information technology management and procurement ...