October is the scariest month of the year, but not because of Halloween. While the rest of the nation prepares for trick-or-treaters, during October the government observes National Cybersecurity Awareness Month (NCAM) to remind agencies of the scariest danger facing Americans today: cyber-threats. According to Federal CIO Grant Schneider, the U.S government has “come a […]

By October 1st of 2019, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) will be dissolved with its various functions transferring to other U.S agencies, thanks to an executive order signed by the President in April. While some have found the move perplexing (“out of the blue” as one columnist put it), OPM employees and management have […]

In many ways, the worst thing that can happen for cybersecurity in the public sector is an interruption of operations. During the 35 day shutdown of the U.S government which occurred between December 22, 2018 and January 25th of this year, massive furloughs left IT systems unmanaged throughout federal agencies. From FBI, to DoD and […]

Background When Amazon Web Services was proposed in 2003 by Benjamin Black, it had already been a year since the U.S Government completed its effort to create and finalize the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA) – which defined IT security across public agencies and partners. This update to U.S. law had taken fifteen years […]

In the past decade, it has become clear that the U.S security clearance process is in a state of crisis. Security clearance is required by all federal employees or employees of cleared contractors with access to classified information – those who need it range from janitors to senior management, and as of 2017, 700,000 individuals […]

In 2014, Sony was ostensibly held ransom by North Korean attackers calling themselves the ‘Guardians of Peace’ in retaliation against anti-DPRK film The Interview. The incident made headlines around the world, along with chilling images left across company screens depicting a skeleton and links to the publicly leaked data. It was a sensation which gave […]