The Daily Scoop Podcast

Halfway through calendar year 2023, the Pentagon’s Office of the Chief Information Officer has accomplished quite a lot in a short amount of time, from early work implementing zero trust to first task order awards under the department’s Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability contract, according to CIO John Sherman. And there’s much more to come through the rest of the year, Sherman said during a keynote recently at DefenseTalks 2023. Listen in to Sherman’s progress update for his office so far in 2023 and what he sees as the way ahead. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher. And if you like what you hear, please let us know in the comments.

Army CISO Jan Norris has almost been on the job for a year. During that time, the Army has been on a whirlwind of a cybersecurity journey, modernizing its systems and adopting a zero trust security architecture while facing, as Norris put it, weekly breaches and Threat activity, data leaks, and the new discoveries on an ever expanding cyber attack surface. Norris recently shared about this journey and his first year as CISO during a keynote at Swish Data’s GIST 23 conference. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher. And if you like what you hear, please let us know in the comments.

Capt. Erickson took the stage recently at the SWISH Data GIST 23 conference to share more about what his nascent office is doing to elevate data for transformation within the Coast Guard. Listen to what he had to say. Agencies across the federal government are looking to the cloud to elevate their next-gen computing capabilities. In this interview with Scoop News group’s Wyatt Kash, Christian Hoff of AWS,highlights how NOAA, Customs and Border Protection and other agencies are using the cloud to advance their high-performance computing, data management and AI efforts — and what to look for at the upcoming AWS Summit in Washington, D.C. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher. And if you like what you hear, please let us know in the comments.

The Department of Agriculture has a vast array of customers, from farmers to families. USDA is working to personalize content and experiences across multiple channels. Simchah Suvekye-Bogin, chief customer experience officer in USDA’s Office of Customer Experience, explains how her organization is improving customer experience and best practices they’ve learned along the way. The Internal Revenue Service is another agency looking to modernize the digital front door for citizens. David Aten, human capital officer at IRS, tells Wyatt Kash how his agency is modernizing their website and giving American citizens a more “consumer-grade” experience. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher. And if you like what you hear, please let us know in the comments.

Agencies across government are moving to become more data-driven. At GIST 23 last week, Scoop News Group’s Wyatt Kash spoke with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Chief Information Security Officer Shane Barney, to discuss how USCIS is using data to bolster its cybersecurity strategy. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher. And if you like what you hear, please let us know in the comments.

Kelly Fletcher has been with the Department of State for more than half a year now. The agency’s newest chief information officer has been tasked with leading the strategic direction of IT for the department, with oversight of over $2.5 billion worth of programs. Scoop News Group’s Wyatt Kash spoke with Fletcher about how her organization is building a broader IT modernization strategy. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher. And if you like what you hear, please let us know in the comments.

The U.S. government has issued a number of initiatives to make government data more widely accessible and useful — including the Federal Data Strategy, the Evidence Act and the Open Government Data Act. Federal technology officers are now making concerted efforts to implement policies to transform data into more valuable assets for their constituents and stakeholders. Justin Marsico, chief data officer at the Bureau of the Fiscal Service, and Michael Holck, vice president of software engineering at ICF, tell Scoop News Group’s Wyatt Kash how government is making data more accessible. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher. And if you like what you hear, please let us know in the comments.

The Government Accountability Office is highlighting 37 areas in this year's High Risk List. GAO says progress has been made in 16 of those areas, the most since the watchdog began rating high-risk areas eight years ago. Michelle Sager, managing director for strategic issues at the Government Accountability Office, explains what’s new to the list this year and the progress that has been made on cybersecurity and IT issues areas across government. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher. And if you like what you hear, please let us know in the comments.

Jeff Rothblum is a senior professional staff member for the U.S. Senate Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs Committee and Cara Mumford is the Majority Subcommittee Director for the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Protection Subcommittee on the House Homeland Security Committee. In a highlight from the CrowdStrike Government Summit, Mumford and Rothblum explain how their organizations are monitoring national cybersecurity defense. As you’ve heard on The Daily Scoop Podcast, April is National Supply Chain Integrity Month. It’s a partnership between the National Counterintelligence and Security Center and partners across government and industry to raise awareness on the issue. At the CrowdStrike Government Summit, Camille Stewart Gloster, deputy national cyber director for technology and ecosystem security at the White House, tells CrowdStrike’s Drew Bagley her organization’s mission. The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher. And if you like what you hear, please let us know in the comments.

The National Security Agency’s Cybersecurity Directorate is tasked with preventing and eradicating threats to U.S. national security systems, focusing mainly on the defense industrial base and the country’s weapons security. At the CrowdStrike Government Summit, Director of NSA’s Cybersecurity Directorate Rob Joyce breaks down the current threat landscape his organization is tracking. There’s a new Zero Trust Maturity Model from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency. The latest version of the guidance updates implementation guidelines for agencies across key pillars like identity, networks and workloads of data. CISA Director Jen Easterly spoke with CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz at last week’s summit. In a highlight from their conversation, Easterly explains how this guidance is different than previous versions The Daily Scoop Podcast is available every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon. If you want to hear more of the latest from Washington, subscribe to The Daily Scoop Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher. And if you like what you hear, please let us know in the comments.