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Modernization
NSA’s secret Amazon-developed cloud environment progressing ‘very well’
The agency's $10 billion cloud program dubbed “WildandStormy" is benefiting from the intelligence community's dozen years of experience in commercial cloud, an AWS official said.
Acquisition
GSA further details its plan for Ascend cloud program
Software-as-a-service vendors and providers of cloud-related IT professional services are who the General Services Administration wants to hear from now.
Artificial Intelligence
CIA looks to fast track AI adoption through cloud contract
A CIA official said the agency is working with the five recipients of its Commercial Cloud Enterprise contract to “get commercial [large language models] up into our high-side environments.”
Emerging Tech
The Pentagon’s IT agency looks to expand cloud offshore
The agency has been expanding services outside the continental U.S. while reworking tools to ease data access.
Emerging Tech
Pentagon planning huge experiment for its connect-everything concept
“We see significant progress,” in opening up DOD data, one observer said. But a bigger, multinational test is coming.
Artificial Intelligence
Microsoft, Palantir partner to expand AI offerings to defense and intelligence agencies
The new suite of offerings will be available on Microsoft’s Azure Government and Azure Government Secret and Top Secret clouds.
Defense
Air Force seeks secure cloud app to manage flights for govt VIPs
The new tool is critical “due to significant cybersecurity vulnerabilities identified in the existing scheduling system,” the branch says in a notice for industry.
Acquisition
Treasury’s funding request for IRS cloud tech far outpaces other civilian agencies, report says
Treasury’s request is the largest out of a combined federal civilian total of almost $9 billion for cloud-related programs in their fiscal year 2025 IT budget requests.
Modernization
OMB rewrites cloud buying rulebook
The FedRAMP program received its first major update in more than a decade
Updated
Cybersecurity
Biden briefed on CrowdStrike IT outage as multiple federal systems impacted
Social Security offices are closed for the day due to the incident. It will be “time-consuming” for all affected systems to undo the damage because the process is manual, one expert says.
Modernization
Treasury looks to help the financial sector move to the cloud
Among the potential risks: market concentration among cloud service providers.
Acquisition
FedRAMP unveils new framework for prioritizing emerging tech
The cloud security program’s new Emerging Technology Prioritization Framework spells out new processes and guidance for cloud services providers specifically offering AI-based capabilities.
Ideas
Is the government losing $500M a year in cloud savings?
COMMENTARY | Multiyear discounts enjoyed by commercial cloud customers aren't reaching the government because of federal spending laws.
Acquisition
Interior awards 7 seats on $2B cloud license contract
This second iteration of the program focuses on the development of a cloud-based production environment and application migration.
Acquisition
GSA names 7 leaders to inaugural FedRAMP board
The move comes as GSA and OMB modernize the cloud security program to implement recent legislative changes.
Defense
The Pentagon’s brewing a build-a-cloud program for defense agencies
The young platform, dubbed Olympus, is designed for self-service commercial cloud needs.
Artificial Intelligence
Microsoft deploys air-gapped AI for classified defense, intelligence customers
GPT-4 will be on offer for classified workloads via Azure Government Top Secret.
Acquisition
Oracle achieves authorization to host secret classified data
Oracle Cloud Infrastructure is now available to U.S. government customers at all classification levels.
Acquisition
Google is now authorized to host classified data in the cloud
The security milestone puts Google in a position to compete for classified business at DOD and U.S. intelligence agencies.
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Acquisition