Cybersecurity

Pass-the-Hash

In many ways, the advancement of hacking has truly come to the fore. Attack vectors are coalescing, evolving and advancing the breadth and scope of their impact. There's no better example of this than the pass-the-hash technique, considered by security expert Ed Skoudis to be one of 2010's most dangerous attack vectors.

People

Is it leadership and innovation? Or leadership vs. innovation?

FCW cartoonist John Klossner ponders the different approaches to managing for change.

People

Contest: How many federal employees does it take to change a light bulb?

FCW cartoonist and blogger John Klossner is taking entries now, with plans to publish the best and worst in a future blog post.

Digital Government

HHS starts sharing health care data

Government Computer News

Digital Government

ACLU sues government for data on e-spying law

Civil liberties groups filed a lawsuit against the federal government on Thursday seeking the release of documents showing how a controversial electronic spying law is being implemented and whether the communications of U.S. citizens are being monitored improperly.

Digital Government

Some worry SEC's proposed system to monitor stock markets too ambitious

Exchanges would have few practice runs to submit detailed trading information, increasing the risk the data could be flawed.

Cybersecurity

Panel to recommend certifications for cybersecurity workforce

New report from nonpartisan commission will suggest the federal government establish a certifying body to test skills of potential hires.

Digital Government

Hackathon weekend could yield solutions for disaster relief

Federal CTO Aneesh Chopra encourages people to hack to save lives

Digital Government

‘Inherently governmental’ remains a sticky wicket

The Office of Federal Procurement Policy is getting closer to adopting a final rule that contains a clearer definition of what constitutes an “inherently governmental” function—i.e., one that should be done only by federal employees. But judging from the comments filed on the proposed rule, no one is completely thrilled.

Digital Government

Cyberattack Estimate: 250K an Hour

Army Gen. Keith B. Alexander, the head of the new U.S. Cyber Command, estimates that bad actors now probe Defense Department networks and systems 250,000 times an hour -- or some 6 million times a day. Or this: 2.19 billion times a year.

Digital Government

Advise and Consent

As the country lurches toward a future in which electronic medical records replace paper files that are at present the industry standard, resolving the question of how much control patients should have over digital files continues to be a sticky wicket.

Cybersecurity

CIOs Push New Software Settings

Two members of the <a href="http://www.cio.gov/">CIO council</a> have proposed baseline candidate settings for Windows 7 and Internet Explorer 8, an attempt to implement and secure new software without compromising existing security settings.

Ideas

Social Media's Increasing Drivel

Social networking, Twitter in particular because of its tight limits on characters, has given rise to a new set of clichés, trite musings and empty phrases. Danny Brown, a writer at Lawrence Ragan Communications Inc., a public relations firm in Chicago, <a href=http://www.ragan.com/ME2/Audiences/dirmod.asp?sid=&nm=&type=MultiPublishing&mod=PublishingTitles&mid=5AA50C55146B4C8C98F903986BC02C56&tier=4&id=192A51224B77420EA2D12867A99BF25E&AudID=3FF14703FD8C4AE98B9B4365B978201A>wrote</a> on Thursday that many of these worn out quips need to be extracted for good from social media.