FCW Insider: Sept. 25

Comment: A call for visionary investment

Investing in IT modernization is not an either-or proposition, Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.) writes. This pandemic has presented Congress a choice: We can put our head in the sand and pretend these failures didn't happen, or we can take action to be prepared for the future.

Army tests the limits of its integrated tactical network

The Army's Project Convergence exercise has put the Integrated Tactical Network to the test. But holes in its availability prove there's work to be done.

NARA looks to multi-cloud

The federal government's archive drafting a multi-cloud storage acquisition strategy to accommodate other agencies' digital data.

Cancel culture: Tales from the U.S. and China

Steve Kelman looks at how a tale of cancel culture in the U.S. was misunderstood in China.

Quick Hits

*** The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency reports that an unnamed federal agency was hacked recently. The attack used compromised credentials to plant malware on an agency network – and that malware evaded cybersecurity protections and gave attackers "persistent access" that exploited "weaknesses in the agency's firewall." An after-action report from U.S.-CERT details the technique used to breach agency defenses and how the attack was mitigated.

*** The bipartisan Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress passed a slate of 40 recommendations to improve the functioning of Congress and to restore diminished Constitutional responsibilities. Recommendations include improving calendaring for committees to avoid conflicts and help with scheduling, standardize some staff training, encourage more bipartisan legislation and committee work through trips and retreats, establishing a Congressional Digital Services Task Force and perhaps most crucially take ownership of the budget and appropriations process.