Category Archives: budget

Trump budget would decimate DHS’s scientific research arm

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The Trump administration’s budget plan calls for large, painful cuts to the Department of Homeland Security’s scientific research and development programs, $144 million in all, which critics charge will decimate DHS efforts to develop tomorrow’s cybersecurity technologies. Although the fiscal 2018 plans have yet to be approved by Congress, DHS is moving ahead, making preparations to close three of its national laboratories and defund half-a-dozen centers of excellence it has supported at universities around the country. Officials are also moving to shutter a number of other cybersecurity programs including the much-touted Transition To Practice, or TTP, program — which helps get cybersecurity technology developed in the national labs or at universities out into the commercial marketplace through training, partnership and funding. DHS’s Science and Technology Directorate would be allocated $627 million in the budget for fiscal 2018, which starts Oct. 1, compared to the $771 million it actually got this year — a proposed cut of more than 18 […]

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NSA’s Rogers asks for big budget bump to separate U.S. Cyber Command

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The nation’s top cyberwarrior bluntly told a House panel Tuesday that it would take a 16 percent increase in U.S. Cyber Command’s budget to separate it from the NSA and become a full-fledged combatant command, as lawmakers want. “To execute our mission I have asked for a budget of $647 million, which is a nearly 16 percent increase from 2017,” Adm. Michael Rogers told a hearing of the Armed Services Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities convened by Chairwoman Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., to examine the fiscal 2018 request for Cyber Command. Rogers, who leads Cyber Command and is also NSA director, said the money would be spent “building out” the command’s cyber fighting units, called Cyber Mission Forces, and other cyber-specific capabilities. The 6,200-strong CMF is on track to be fully operational by Oct. 1 next year, he said. The National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal 2017 mandated the elevation of Cyber Command — which […]

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Budget would boost DHS cyber efforts in NCCIC, CDM

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President Trump’s budget proposal, unveiled Tuesday, would boost spending on the Department of Homeland Security’s 24-hour digital-attack watch center by almost $50 million and more than double the funding for a governmentwide online security tools program to $279 million. The proposal would also treble the size of the tiny team of DHS cybersecurity advisers who work with key businesses across the country. Despite these increases, not every tech element of the department got its funding goosed. Research and development in the DHS Science and Technology Directorate was slashed by $100 million and the allocation for the CIO office was also down $60 million. In documents released by the department and the White House Office of Management and Budget, the administration says it is asking for $3.28 billion for DHS’s National Protection and Programs Directorate, which includes most of the department’s cyber functions. It would be an increase of $196 million over fiscal 2017. The […]

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OMB stakes out central role in cyber, IT modernization

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The White House Office of Management and Budget will be at the center of the Trump administration’s move to modernize and secure federal computer networks, the government’s senior-most IT official said Wednesday. The agency is at the hinge where several important IT initiatives meet the federal budgeting process, explained acting federal CIO Margie Graves. Not only does it help implement the Federal Information Security Modernization Act, or FISMA, but it also has new tasks under the cybersecurity executive order signed recently. Under the EO, every federal agency or department has to conduct a risk assessment using the Cybersecurity Framework developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, and then submit it to the OMB director and the Homeland Security secretary. That process, she told the Public Sector Innovation Summit presented by VMware, was the essential underpinning for both security and modernization efforts because it identifies the areas where investment is needed.  It also had the added benefit […]

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Canada Is Investing $2 Billion in a Climate Disaster Mitigation Fund

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In its new federal budget, Canada invests in machine learning and teaching kids to code, but offers no real plan for how to address workplace automation. Continue reading Canada Is Investing $2 Billion in a Climate Disaster Mitigation Fund→

Bossert promises funding, centralization for federal cybersecurity

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President Donald Trump’s budget outline, slated for release Thursday, will propose significant increases in funding for federal cybersecurity, White House homeland security adviser Thomas Bossert said Wednesday. “President Trump intends to put his money where his mouth is,” Bossert said in his his first major policy speech. “Cybersecurity will be funded through DHS and the Department of Defense,” he told the Center for Strategic and International Studies in a keynote address at its Cyber Disrupt 2017 event. Privately, he told a small group prior to his remarks that there would be a “significant plus up” for cyber programs in both DHS and the Pentagon, one of the organizers told CyberScoop. Bossert also promised that the Obama administration’s push to modernize and centralize federal computer networks will continue under Trump. “Federal networks at this point can no longer sustain themselves. We cannot tolerate indefensible technology, outdated antiquated hardware and software,” Bossert said. “Modernization […]

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