Ahead of the Google Public Sector Summit on Wednesday, Oct. 16, Karen Dahut, the CEO of the organization, joined the Daily Scoop Podcast to preview this year’s event and share her thoughts on some of the top trends in the public sector technology space. Of course, artificial intelligence adoption was a key topic of our discussion, but she also detailed the remaining need for agencies to prioritize continued cloud adoption and security.

Login.gov, the single sign-on platform provided by the General Services Administration, will begin offering a new identity verification option to its partners. GSA’s new option will verify identity with facial recognition technology through the independently certified NIST 800-63 Identity Assurance Level 2 (IAL2), a standard that introduces the need for either remote or physically present identity proofing, according to a Wednesday press release.

A final rule announced by the White House on Thursday will further codify and clarify responsibilities for U.S. agencies when it comes to accurate and trusted federal statistics. Specifically, the regulation will outline how federal statistical agencies should carry out responsibilities to produce information that’s relevant and timely, credible and accurate, objective, and protects the trust of respondents and those providing the information by ensuring confidentiality of responses. That final rule, also known as the “Trust Regulation,” was posted for public inspection Thursday and will officially be published in the Federal Register on Friday.

The Department of Health and Human Services is working on a new strategic plan for the use of artificial intelligence across the entire breadth of its mission, the department’s top AI official said Tuesday. Micky Tripathi — HHS’s acting chief AI officer and its assistant secretary for technology policy — said at the NVIDIA AI Summit in Washington, D.C., that the AI strategic plan should arrive sometime in January and that it will span “the entire, you know, sort of breadth of what the department covers.

Budget constraints on research and development are limiting science and technology efforts across the federal landscape, according to a quadrennial White House report released this week and a top Biden administration official.The Quadrennial Science and Technology Review Report, unveiled Monday, noted that federal agencies are working to manage current funding for federally funded R&D, but the administration is in a position where it must “continue advocating for robust” levels.

Scoop News Group is thrilled to announce the winners of the FedScoop 50 awards for 2024! Now in their 13th year, the FedScoop 50 awards honor the most impactful leaders in the federal government who strive each day to leverage technology to transform government. Scoop News Group once again experienced record voting for the FedScoop 50 in 2024, receiving more than 1 million votes across five categories. As the Biden administration comes to a close, and the federal government prepares for a period of transition, it’s an apt time to reflect on the transformation ushered in over the past year at the hands of selfless government officials and industry partners dedicated to bringing progress to our nation and the American people.

The Energy Department could be a key force in counteracting the “profit motive” driving America’s leading artificial intelligence companies, the agency’s second-in-command said in an interview. DOE Deputy Secretary David Turk told FedScoop that top AI firms aren’t motivated to pursue all the use cases most likely to benefit the public, leaving the U.S. government — which maintains a powerful network of national labs now developing artificial intelligence infrastructure of their own — to play an especially critical role. Turk’s comments come as the Energy Department pushes forward with a series of AI initiatives. One key program is the Frontiers in Artificial Intelligence for Science, Security, and Technology, or FASST effort, which is meant to advance the use of powerful datasets maintained by the agency in order to develop science-forward AI models.

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If you missed FedTalks last month, you missed a fantastic panel on how federal agencies are preparing for the age of quantum. Fresh off of NIST’s release of new post-quantum cryptography standards, Nick Polk, Branch Director for Federal Cybersecurity, Executive Office of the President; Ann Dunkin, CIO of the Department of Energy; and Michael Hayduk, Deputy Director, Information Directorate, Quantum, Air Force Research Laboratory discussed what’s ahead as they look to secure federal systems and information from attacks powered by quantum computers.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology’s Artificial Intelligence Safety Institute is seeking information on the development of chemical and biology-focused artificial intelligence models. In a Federal Register posting, the AISI said it is specifically interested in potential benchmarks and evaluation tools for understanding these models, as well as guidance on mitigating the kind of security risks they might raise.

As the Department of Defense experiments with biometric devices to better track the health and wellness of personnel, it issued a $96 million award last week to Finnish health technology company Oura to put its smart rings and services in the hands of service members. While the department didn’t specify in the award announcement how many rings would be purchased under the firm-fixed-price contract — the rings retail for $299-$349 — it explains that the contract will also provide a suite of data analytics services the Pentagon’s health arm can use to take action on the biometric information generated by the devices.

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Agencies’ reporting required on various website and digital services benchmarks required by the 21st Century Integrated Digital Experience Act is often incomplete and inconsistent, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office. The congressional watchdog found that full compliance with the 2018 law — which mandates annual reports from the 24 Chief Financial Officers Act agencies on federal website standards and eight modernization requirements — is lacking, resulting in submitted reports with “varying levels of content and detail.”

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New federal guidance for acquiring artificial intelligence solutions directs U.S. agencies to take steps to manage risks, promote competition and share information within the executive branch. The White House Office of Management and Budget on Thursday publicly released its anticipated memorandum on responsible AI acquisition in government (M-24-18), charting an initial path forward for agencies to buy products that use the booming technology in a safe and responsible way and placing new criteria on those contracts.

T​​he federal government is in a “great place” following an agencywide deadline on zero-trust architecture implementation and now looking ahead to more challenging aspects of the cybersecurity model, according to a White House official. Mike Duffy, the acting federal chief information security officer, said in an interview with FedScoop that the next phase of zero-trust architecture implementation will focus largely on operations, taking near-term technical controls and leveraging those into a “longer-term technology transformation effort” and more defensible architectures.

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The General Services Administration is conducting market research through the agency’s eBuy program for the CIO Modernization and Enterprise Transformation II (COMET II), which is anticipated to be worth up to $1 billion. The request for quotes, which was shared in an email with FedScoop, aims to provide industry with the draft COMET II Performance Work Statement (PWS) as well as gain feedback on the initial task orders and the PWS.

Also: The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency is pushing forward on its oversight of federal post-quantum cryptography migration, unveiling a strategy document last week that details how the agency intends to monitor and assess governmentwide progress on the transition. The public release of CISA’s guidance on Friday, required by a 2022 Office of Management and Budget memorandum on migrating to post-quantum cryptography, lays out plans for the deployment of automated cryptography discovery and inventory (ACDI) tools to aid agencies as they work to inventory any IT systems or assets that may contain vulnerable cryptography.

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Customs and Border Protection CTO Sunil Madhugiri joins the podcast for a wide-ranging interview. During the discussion, he highlights CBP’s developing AI portfolio, how the emerging technology landscape is evolving, what else is top of mind for the agency heading into 2025, and much more.

With ransomware gangs proving capable of quickly reconstituting after government takedown operations, an international alliance wants to ramp up those offensive measures even more. Anne Neuberger, deputy national security advisor for cyber and emerging technology, told reporters in a call Monday that the U.S. has observed that there is no one operation that’s going to disrupt ransomware permanently and instead, the nation must increase the frequency and increase the breadth of operations combating ransomware, such as targeting the exchanges that are facilitating money laundering and ransomware activity.

A service created by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency to spur the sharing of cyber threat indicators and defensive measures is floundering due to a lack of outreach, according to a new watchdog report. The Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General found that the use of CISA’s Automated Indicator Sharing (AIS) system has fallen to its lowest level since 2017, with a 93% decline in the sharing of cyber threat indicators from 2020 to 2022.

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Pentagon leadership will accelerate high-volume production of technologies designed to detect, track and destroy enemy drones via “Replicator 2.0,” DefenseScoop has learned. This development marks the first public report of the second capability focus area under the Replicator initiative — a high-profile effort that underpins the Defense Department’s multifaceted plan to deter China. According to a memorandum signed by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Sept. 27 and viewed by DefenseScoop ahead of publication Monday, the Pentagon “will tackle the warfighter priority of countering the threat posed by small uncrewed aerial systems (C-sUAS) to our most critical installations and force concentrations” under Replicator 2.0.

The Department of Veterans Affairs is making tele-emergency care available nationwide following a pilot that the agency credited with helping over 60,000 callers. In a Thursday announcement, the VA announced that tele-EC, which aims to increase “timely access to virtual emergency care options” for veterans enrolled in VA health care, will be available across the nation to assist those who are unsure if what they’re experiencing is a minor emergency or not.

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