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The Risk Factor blogger Bob Charette, a risk management expert who consults with federal agencies on risk management, picked up yesterday's story on the deep trouble that the Census Bureau's handheld computer contract is in. In his blog post, he questions the credibility of the Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI®). Harris Corp.'s Government Communications Systems Division, which is the prime contractor on the $600 million handheld contract (now likely much more than $650 million after all the costs from changes, errors and delays are included), has a Maturity Level 3 rating. "The Level 3 rating denotes superior process maturity within the division's program management, engineering, quality assurance, and other disciplines, and achievement of this rating has become a competitive differentiator on many government programs," Charette quotes.

Charette wants to know: "At the very least, I think the division's CMMI rating may need to be re-evaluated, or maybe better, the U.S. government better start looking at what, if anything, SEI CMMI Level 3 actually means in practice."

Or it could mean, the customer, the Census Bureau, put too many demands on Harris -- so many, in fact, that no maturity designation, no matter how high, could have avoided the very problems that now threaten the viability of the U.S. census.

If you've ever gone through airport security with a laptop (and one-quarter of the flying public does), you'll know just how stressful it is trying to juggle your overcoat, briefcase and shoes while trying to pull your laptop out of its carrying case to place it in one of those gray plastic bins. It seems the Transportation Security Administration feels our pain. The agency has issued a request for information asking industry to come up with its best ideas for laptop cases that would allow TSA to scan the guts of the laptop while still in its carrying bag, according to an article posted by Government Security News. TSA's reasoning for the new bag:

If TSA was able to eliminate this requirement, it could lower passenger stress levels, increase checkpoint throughput, and reduce the number of claims TSA receives for laptops that have been damaged during screening.

It's not as easy as it sounds. TSA will not allow any zippers, pockets, clips, pens, cell phones or other paraphernalia we all stuff into laptop bag pockets to block the X-rays from viewing the inside of the laptop.

Industry has until April 17 to respond.

Government Executive's Robert Brodsky reported today about how the Environmental Protection Agency may have wasted millions of dollars in extra fees to contractors for meeting performance thresholds. "EPA regularly gave contractors ratings of 'exceeds expectations' or 'outstanding,' which facilitated the higher incentive fees, according to" an EPA inspector general report.

Brodsky cites one of the nine contracts the IG analyzed, in which a high rating "was justified only with the following comment: 'The project management was excellent with no problems encountered and costs were within scope of work.' A project that merely encountered no problems or stayed within budget should have earned a grade of satisfactory, the IG said."

Since government projects typically miss deadline and come in over budget, encountering no problems and keeping costs within scope may seem like quite an accomplishment. Others may view it it as simply doing your job.

The Billboard Liberation Front, a group of so-called "culture jammers" who, among other acts, alter the wording of billboard advertisements to make a political or anti-corporate message, have hit again. The group has claimed credit for altering an AT&T billboard in San Francisco to protest AT&T's collaboration with the National Security Agency's warrantless wiretapping of Americans' phones and Internet usage.





















The billboard was a bit too late to influence the telecoms, who've announced this past week to continue the surveillance program.

Hat tip: boingboing

Google engineering manager Alan Newberger blogged yesterday about the software giant’s pilot program with Cleveland Clinic, which integrates patients’ electronic health records with their Google accounts. The initiative seems the first step in a long-term goal to provide citizens with universal access to their medical histories, and the ability to quickly exchange information with insurance plans, medical groups, pharmacies and hospitals.

Patients don’t have to participate in the program. Those that opt in will give authorization via Google’s “AuthSub” interface. Still, the initiative is sounding the alarm bells for privacy rights groups – the same groups that have spoken out against a national health network and other government-sponsored electronic health efforts.

Maybe a watchful eye on how Google handles the situation, including the very real privacy and confidentiality concerns, will provide the federal government a clue on how to get their own initiatives moving. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time industry paved the road.

First, it was the scare that electro-magnetic radiation emitted by computer monitors may cause skin rashes and abnormal pregnancies. Now you have to worry about catching a virus or staph infection from your computer keyboard or mouse (the pointing device).

But have no fear, a newsletter -- Washable Keyboard News -- just announced that it will "keep industry stakeholders abreast of current information that will help them to equip their home or work environments with appropriate technology for mitigating the transmission of these germs."

Unotron's Washable Corded Standard Keyboard

The newsletter is published by Unotron, "an emerging company that designs and manufactures high quality, washable data input and security devices that can be easily cleaned and disinfected to maximize user safety and minimize risk in nearly any environment," according to its Web site. Unotron tells us this unsettling factoid: "PC keyboards harbor more than 3,000 microbes per square inch - as compared to toilet seats' 49."

The site also has individual sections for health care, education, commercial and government. Seems as if viruses are sector specific, although the copy for each section is identical. Although we learn that the company will soon introduce smart card readers and fingerprint readers will soon use the company's SpillSeal® technology. Just in time for HSPD-12.

In the last month, SRA International has lost two top executives with deep government information technology experience. Dan Chenok, formerly branch chief for Information Policy and Technology at the Office of Management and Budget, considered one of the top IT management posts in the White House, announced he was leaving his senior vice president position at SRA to join Pragmatics Inc., which works with federal agencies to provide integration and information security solutions. Chenok was instrumental in creating OMB's IT and e-government policy and budget.

In January, Mary Ellen Condon, a former director of information management and security for the Justice Department working on information security, left her post at SRA to join federal consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton as a principal in the Assurance and Resilience Service. At SRA, Condon was vice president and director of strategic services. Condon also held senior-level IT positions at the Agriculture Department, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (now part of the Citizenship and Immigration Services in the Homeland Security Department), and the Energy Department. She also is a founding member of the federal Chief Information Officers Council.

After much speculation, Rep. Tom Davis, R-Va., confirmed yesterday that he will not run for office in 2008. As Republicans and Democrats scramble to defend or snag (respectively) the Davis' congressional seat, the technology community – both in and outside government – bids farewell to a staunch advocate.

The list of IT issues that benefited from Davis' support is long. In his early days in Congress, he founded the Information Technology Working Group to promote a better understanding of issues important to the computer and technology industries. He sponsored the Y2K Act, which encouraged Y2K compliance in industry, and later helped pushed several bills through Congress that advanced efforts to more strategically implement IT: the E-Gov Act of 2002, the Federal Information Security Act, and the Critical Infrastructure Information Act, to name a few. He speaks frequently in support of changes to trade agreement laws that would make it far easier for agencies to purchase technology goods and services.

Phil Bond, the president and CEO of the Information Technology Association of America, described Davis as the “ultimate champion for technology in Congress,” helping to “tear down the wall between the federal government and commercial technologies.

“When other members needed to get smart on IT, they often called Tom,” Bond said in a prepared statement.

Now what? In a statement released this afternoon, Davis said that he has not yet decided what opportunities to pursue, "but it’s clear to me that returning to the private sector and reacquainting myself with that view of the world is the best move." He was careful to call his departure “a sabbatical from public life,” keeping the door open for a return to government, but no doubt the number of offers coming his way in the meantime promises to be staggering -- if it isn't already -- as IT firms and organizations scramble for the chance to profit from his knowledge of government IT as well as his influence.

The Information Technology Association of America (ITAA) and the Government Electronics and Information Technology Association (GEIA) announced yesterday that their merger had been approved by both organizations’ boards of directors. The merger is expected to close on April 1.

As reported in November, the two organizations have planned to merge in hopes of combining their messages and influence on Capitol Hill. The new organization will represent almost 400 technology companies, most of which are federal contractors.

“The new organization will be more of a one-stop shop for government to interface with the industry,” said Phil Bond, President and CEO of ITAA.

Under the terms of the merger GEIA will form a third group under the ITAA banner along with the existing public and commercial sector groups. The new board of directors will have equal representation from both organizations. Dan Heinemeier, formerly President of GEIA, will continue to lead that group as Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of ITAA.

“At a fundamental level, we need to do a better job of presenting to the policymakers the importance of IT to fulfilling their missions and the economy’s performance,” Bond said. “We haven’t done as good a job as we might because we have scattered voices, on everything from procurement to economic issues like the knowledge economy and research & development.”

Bond added that while the increased oversight of procurement practices led by House Oversight Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Ca.) influenced the decision, it was not a primary cause for the merger. “Waxman is just one factor, not the instigator or initial reason,” Bond said. “Our members saw the complimentary nature of the two organizations and saw an opportunity to get a stronger voice. Certainly they understood that with increased oversight, they would need that stronger voice. But it was not a primary factor.”

Usually, when a company toots its own horn it's because the positives aren't noteworthy enough to speak for themselves. Not so in the case of Chantilly, Va.-based solution provider GTSI. The company has promoted its recent accomplishments hard, but with what seems like good reasons.

Most federal agencies know GTSI. The company made its name (and profits) for the majority of its 25 years in business by selling IT products. But changes in how the federal government buys IT, poor corporate management decisions and a botched ERP system implementation led GTSI to a $16 million loss in 2005, no line of credit and a 55 percent employee attrition rate.

Fast forward two years to the present. The company's services revenue has grown from $18 million to $150 million -- that's a 733 percent growth rate. Earlier this month GSA awarded GTSI a Mission Oriented Business Integrated Services (MOBIS) Schedule, which some might argue as confirmation that company efforts to transition from product peddler to services provider are working. In its third quarter of 2007, its gross margin reached nearly 15 percent and operating expenses declined more than 5 percent. Sales for that same period declined 25 percent, but management points to the corporate decision to not discount orders of less than $10,000 and net certain software and service offerings as the reason. Net income for the quarter was $5.5 million compared to a let loss of $3.4 million a year ago -- a positive change of 263 percent.

CEO Jim Leto said in a meeting with Government Executive Tuesday that GTSI has achieved all of the objectives he set when he took over the helm in February 2006. Whether or not that will continue remains to be seen. When asked what we might expect for the year-end financials, Leto only said that he hoped a spending bill would get passed sooner rather than later. Maybe that signifies an impending loss, as agencies have slowed IT spending awaiting for the long-delayed passage of a fiscal 2008 appropriations bill. A loss would fall in line with analyst predictions.

But here's the bigger question: If GTSI manages to pull itself consistently back in the black after years of hemorraging cash, will Leto stick around? Not likely. Last month, he relinquished 'president' from his title, promoting Scott Friedlander from executive vice president to president and chief operating officer. Chances are that was step one in a planned succession. Leto is undoubtedly a turnaround CEO, having done exactly that for a number of other companies that he later sold off. At the very least, GTSI's success might spur Leto's retirement (his third, he will tell you). If that does indeed happen in the near future -- and Leto would neither confirm nor deny when asked -- it could be the best sign for the company yet. As stated by Bill Weber, GTSI's senior vice president of programs and services: "The goal of the management team is to let him retire."

The word ‘retirement’ doesn’t count for much in government. As soon as an official graciously departs his or her post, industry pounces. Such is the case of former U.S. Army CIO, Steven Boutelle, who retired less than four months ago. He has joined Cisco Systems as vice president of the networking vendor’s Global Government Solutions Group.

Boutelle will lead Cisco’s participation in the Internet Routing in Space program, which is a collaboration between industry and government to demonstrate the viability of conducting military communications through an Internet router in space. In theory, satellite systems could integrate with ground infrastructure for anytime, anywhere IP-based data, video voice and mobile communications.

On Nov. 7, the Sunlight Foundation released software that could prove a valuable tool for Republicans critical of congressional earmarks. The Sunlight Foundation, an organization that, according to its Web site, “supports, develops and deploys new Internet technologies to make information about Congress and the federal government more accessible to the American people,” uses the Google Earth application to plot the locations for almost 1,500 earmarks in the House Defense Appropriations bill.

By downloading Google Earth and a House Defense file, users can locate earmarks on a U.S. map, according to where the funds would be allocated. Click on the pushpin that marks an earmark location and you can find detailed information from Sunlight Foundation’s searchable database, EarmarkWatch.org.

Will the software application play any role in the fate of the House Defense Appropriations bill, which contains an estimated $5 billion in earmarks? Probably not. Congress passed it last week, and President Bush has stated no plans for a veto. Still, Senate Republican leaders that have made earmarks a soapbox issue no doubt cheer the application – along with other Internet efforts to garner support for their cause.

The General Services Administration’s stepped-up pricing checks has schedule contract holders second guessing whether they want to do business with the federal government. But GSA has extended pricing checks to those information technology vendors that do not hold a GSA Schedule. Ingram Micro, which neither has a GSA contract nor sells directly to the federal government, recently had GSA come knocking.

Ingram Micro is an IT distributor with corporate offices in Santa Ana, Calif., and Williamsville, N.Y. The way the company’s federal business works goes something like this: Ingram partners with IT hardware and software vendors; IT resellers (typically small to medium sized) sign on as Ingram customers; those solution providers bid federal IT contracts based on product pricing provided by Ingram and, when they win, place orders for the required products through Ingram, which sources the products from vendor partners. Ingram doesn’t hold federal contracts. Solution providers sell to federal agencies using their own contracts or those held by the IT vendor. In essence, Ingram acts as a middle man.

Until recently, that business model has kept Ingram off GSA’s radar. No longer, said Bob Laclede, vice president and general manager of government and education at Ingram. GSA recently requested the distributor’s pricing data, including discounts. That’s information that Laclede did not think GSA had the authority to ask for. Not true, said GSA spokesperson Brian Filpot. “If an offeror or current contract holder proposal states that [pricing] is based upon [commercial sales of a company] other than its own, then commercial sales practices data must be provided for the manufacturer or distributor or both so that the contracting officer can determine price reasonableness,” he said.

That fact was reinforced Nov. 7 – the same day we asked GSA about the inquiries with Ingram – in a Defense Department memo sent to Defense agency directors by Shay Assad, director of Defense procurement and acquisition policy (DPAP). The purpose of the memo was to “ensure that contracting officers are successful in obtaining the necessary information and data for determining fair and reasonable prices for purchases made from exclusive distributors/dealers” and require notification to the DPAP office when a distributor or dealer refuses to provide required cost data. Chances are Ingram got targeted first because it’s the largest among the IT distributors.

Fair enough, Laclede said, which is why Ingram has been working to provide the data. But when contracting officers start badmouthing his business – that’s another story. Apparently, GSA contracting officers have told resellers that “Ingram is not an authorized GSA distributor and that they [resellers] should take their business elsewhere,” Laclede said. The company’s legal counsel has been alerted of the claims. Explanations for why GSA needs the pricing information make sense, Laclede said, but “what a few of the COs are telling our customers does not.”

Let’s hope GSA finds common ground with distributors, for agencies’ sake. A total of 2,454 Ingram resellers sold into the federal space in 2007, driving $690 million in revenue for Ingram. Take away Ingram and other distributors’ right to supply, you take away many of their contractors’ ability to sell products and services.

In this month’s cover article, CIO Magazine details how Wal-Mart lost its IT edge. The story is applicable to the federal government. The article catalogues how after years of being an IT leader (being among the first to adopt bar-code scanning, satellite communications, electronic data interchange, and a supply chain management system that automatically triggered orders to suppliers when stocks dropped) Wal-Mart’s legendary IT department has fallen on hard times, including some failures in the social networking realm. The IT problems have indirectly contributed to failed ventures in international markets and missed profit projections.

The failed ventures and lower profits may not be specifically applicable to government, but the reasons for Wal-Mart falling off its IT game may be. According to the article, Wal-Mart “has relied too much on centralized decision making” and “analysts say that Wal-Mart's reliance on homegrown IT systems -- and its conviction of their superiority -- needs to change.” Wal-Mart’s chief information officer, Rollin Ford, “must bring in best-of-breed commercial applications,” such as Business Intelligence and other IT tools to improve operations. “We cannot overestimate how much packaged software can help them right now,” says Paula Rosenblum, an analyst and managing partner with Retail Systems Research, according to the article.

Sound familiar? Also, what Wal-Mart is trying to do to recover its "IT mojo," as CIO calls it, holds some lessons for the federal government.

As an aside, it wouldn’t be too surprising if some government IT managers are now feeling redeemed after Wal-Mart was held up as a better relief provider than FEMA after Hurricane Katrina – mostly because of the company’s superior IT operations.

Microsoft has promoted three executives from within to lead its government business. Teresa Carlson was named general manager of U.S. Government Civilian Agencies and International Global Organizations, and Brian Roach general manager of the Federal Department of Defense group. Each will define the strategy and oversee sales, customer satisfaction and performance for their business units. Previously, Carlson served as U.S. director for strategy and operations, and Roach served as manager of Microsoft’s Federal Healthcare organization. Suzanne Behrens, former director of public sector marketing, was named general manager of the company's Business Marketing Organization, handling public sector communications. -- Jill Aitoro

Here's the full press release from Microsoft:

FOR RELEASE

October 3, 2007

Microsoft Advances Three Leaders in its U.S. Public Sector Division

Behrens, Carlson, Roach Each Promoted to General Manager Positions

WASHINGTON, D.C. — October 3, 2007 — Microsoft Corporation has promoted three leaders of its U.S. Public Sector organization. The company named Suzanne Behrens , General Manager of its Business Marketing Organization; Teresa Carlson, General Manager of U.S. Government Civilian Agencies and International Global Organizations; and Brian Roach, General Manager for the Federal Department of Defense group.

Behrens served as director of the government division and most recently public sector marketing. As General Manager she will oversee Microsoft’s public sector marketing and communications efforts, breadth sales, as well as the organization’s citizenship efforts. She leads a team of professionals responsible for developing programs designed to identify business opportunities and facilitate Microsoft’s thought leadership across the public sector, including government and education. She joined Microsoft in 1996.

Carlson, who had served as U.S. director for strategy and operations, now leads the U.S. Government Civilian Agencies and International Global Organizations within the federal division and is responsible for defining the strategy and overseeing the execution of sales, customer satisfaction and performance of these business units. Carlson joined Microsoft in 2002.

Roach, who had served as the Manager of Microsoft’s Federal Healthcare organization, now leads the U.S. Federal Department of Defense business unit and is responsible for defining the strategy and overseeing the execution of sales within the services, combatant commands, and Defense Agencies. Roach joined Microsoft in 1999.

Sun Microsystems Federal Inc., which has been the subject of a congressional inquiry into possible contracting abuses, plans to cancel its General Services Administration Multi-Award Schedule Contract by Oct. 12, according to an email sent by a public relations firm handling Sun Microsystems Federal.

According to the statement released by 463 Communications in Washington, D.C.:

We can confirm that Sun has notified the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) that it is canceling its current GSA Multi-Award Schedule Contract effective October 12, 2007. We took this step reluctantly, as we have always valued our relationship with GSA and its team of committed professionals. Sun and GSA have enjoyed a successful relationship as partners for a number of years during which Sun has provided government agencies with some of the industry's most innovative, energy-efficient, open source and secure computing systems.

Sun remains honored to be a federal contractor and, like other companies in our industry who do not have a GSA multi-award schedule, we look forward to continuing to serve our government customers.

Asked if the inquiry by Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, who has asked for documentation on how much Sun has charged the government for its products, was the reason for Sun's decision to cancel its GSA schedule, a spokesman initially said, "Yes, it is in relation," but added that he would provide a further statement later.

According to a Government Executive article on the subject:

The review involves a contract extension awarded to Sun in September by GSA. The contract has faced scrutiny partly because House Oversight and Government Affairs Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., called GSA Administrator Lurita Doan to testify about her alleged meddling during the business dealings.

At a March hearing, GSA Inspector General Brian Miller stated that Doan and her top staff intervened in negotiations with Sun, going against the judgment of three career contract officers and choosing a higher-priced offer from Sun.

As we all know, moving is a painful experience eased by careful planning. The National-Geospatial Intelligence Agency (NGA) seems to be trying to lessen the pain as much as possible.

The NGA kicked off this week the process for moving 8,500 of its employees, and a whole mess of classified gadgets and gizmos, to new digs at Ft. Belvoir, Va., by 2011.

NGA said in the only procurement notice it plans to issue for the move that it needs a contractor that has the “the proven ability to plan, integrate, organize, synchronize and execute a complex sustained, classified move of equipment, materials” and all the NGA personnel and their office stuff from six locations in the Washington, D.C., area to its new 2.4 million-square-foot building.

NGA is looking for more than a bunch of Irish guys with strong backs and a fleet of trucks. The agency says it needs folks to handle the move who are cleared at the Top Secret/Special Intelligence/Talent Keyhole level.

If anyone knows what all the above means, they’re probably a quarter of the way to getting the job.

The federal government may soon be asked to take a leadership position in reducing the amount of energy that datacenters consume.

According to a report released last week by the Environmental Protection Agency, the federal government, working with the private sector, should develop a standard method to measure how much energy federal datacenters consume; publicly report how much energy each federal datacenter consumes; conduct in two to three years what energy efficient methods can be utilized; and install cost-effective equipment that leads to reduced energy consumption in each datacenter. EPA found that by following certain best practices (including consolidating servers, purchasing energy-efficient servers, installing energy-efficient fans and coolers, and adopting advanced technologies such as “direct liquid cooling), federal data centers could cut up to 80 percent of its electrical demand, producing a savings of $510 million a year.

You may wonder why. It turns out that datacenters and servers are using up an increasing amount of electricity to process, store and manipulate the exploding amount of digital data. And that leads to the emission of more greenhouse gases. Datacenters and servers in the United States accounted for 1.5 percent of all electrical consumption in 2006, double the consumption in 2000, according to the EPA report. If unabated, consumption could double again in the next five years with a cost of $7.4 billion. According to the report:

The peak load on the power grid from these servers and data centers is currently estimated to be approximately 7 gigawatts (GW), equivalent to the output of about 15 baseload power plants. If current trends continue, this demand would rise to 12 GW by 2011, which would require an additional 10 power plants.

No information exists for the number of federal datacenters and servers, but the EPA estimates that the federal government accounts for 10 percent of the national consumption of electricity by all datacenters and servers. Therefore, the report concludes:

These forecasts indicate that unless energy efficiency is improved beyond current trends, the federal government’s electricity cost for servers and data centers could be nearly $740 million annually by 2011, with a peak load of approximately 1.2 GW.

EPA submitted its report to Congress as required by Public Law 109-431, asking the EPA to work with the computer industry to determine if anything can be done to curtail the energy consumption of federal datacenters and servers.

The trend is clear for federal datacenter operators: Expect some new energy requirements coming from the Hill.

We posted an item yesterday about Boston joining other cities, corporations and universities that have created, or plan to create, a virtual replica of their community in Second Life, the animated online world where individuals create avatars and interact with other virtual personalities. The idea for cities is to encourage civic participation; for businesses, to market services and products.

But that's not the only purpose the sites are serving. The virtual communities are now becoming training grounds and recruiting centers for terrorists, according to an article posted by The Australian. An excerpt:

Just as September 11 terrorists practised flying planes on simulators in preparation for their deadly assault on US buildings, law enforcement agencies believe some of those behind the Second Life attacks are home-grown Australian jihadists who are rehearsing for strikes against real targets. ...

Roderick Jones, who is investigating the potential use of the games by terrorists, says SL could easily become a terror classroom. ... Jones says streaming video can be uploaded into SL and a scenario can easily be constructed whereby an experienced bomb-maker could demonstrate how to assemble bombs using his avatar to answer questions as he plays the video.

Terrorist groups have attacked the virtual Second Life headquarters of ABC and Nissan and a Reebok store, leaving explosions that "look like hazy white balls," according to the article. "One radical group, called Second Life Liberation Army, has been responsible for some computer-coded atomic bombings of virtual world stores in the past six months," according to the article.

George Ou, a blogger at ZDNet, takes on Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, over Waxman's call for tighter regulation of peer-to-peer software. After ZDNet posted a story on a Government Reform Committee hearing on how peer-to-peer software threatens national security, Ou wrote that Waxman "hasn’t a clue what he’s talking about and this new round of political grandstanding is absurd." Committee members grilled Mark Gorton, the chairman of peer-to-peer Lime Wire who testified before the committee.

Ou argues that peer-to-peer makers like Gorton are not the problem. Rather, federal information technology shops should do a better job of policing federal employees' computers for peer-to-peer software and to remove it when it is found. "The onus is on the Government or any organization to lock down their infrastructure from the physical layer to the application layer to the people working for them," Ou writes. Good point. Transportation Department chief information officer Daniel Mintz told the committee that DOT, after a peer-to-peer software downloaded on a DOT laptop opened access to government documents, developed a policy that requires "written authorization for installation of P2P programs on government machines," according to the ZDNet article.

But Ou goes a few steps further, which pushes his argument over the edge. He argues that the problem isn't the technology, but the people who use the technology to commit crimes. "Sandy Berger stole secret documents from the National Archives by shoving the documents in to his socks so will Congressman Waxman propose a new law against socks? Will Congressman Waxman call the CEO of Fruit of the Loom to the hearings and grill him about the dangers of socks?"

This misses a finer point. Creators of peer-to-peer software such as Gorton know that their software can be misused to spread malware. It is questionable -- and the committee did raise the questions -- whether Gorton and other peer-to-peer programmers have ignored this fact to spread the use of their software and whether they have been responsible enough in informing users that, if not properly configured, peer-to-peer software can open up personal files. Think of a warning label like you see on a pack of cigarettes. It doesn't take a stretch of the imagination to come up with that possibility. It does take a stretch of the imagination for Fruit of the Loom to consider the possibility of someone using their socks to pilfer documents. Regulation to prevent such an event would be absurd. No one in their right mind would think of such a thing.

Not so for peer to peer. The makers of peer-to-peer software know the dangers that their products present. Just like drug manufacturers know the dangers of misusing the drugs they make. But we have regulations in place to require drug companies to inform the public of possible side effects and the dangers of drug interactions and overdosing. Is it too onerous to ask peer-to-peer manufacturers to act as responsibly? By requiring some action from peer-to-peer providers to better secure their products, together with more vigilance from federal security IT shops, peer to peer can become a safer app and continue to provide value to federal workers.

A former National Security Agency computer expert and two other security epxerts at the Baltimore-based security research firm Security Evaluators report they have found a security vulnerability in Apple's newly released iPhone. "Charles Miller, the principal security analyst for [Security Evaluators], admitted though that Apple’s efforts to make the iPhone a secure environment are quite impressive, but 'once you did manage to find a hole, you were in complete control,'" according to a brief posted by the online newspaper eFluxMedia. According to various news accounts, a hacker can take over an individual's iPhone by luring the user to a Web page, where the user unexpectedly download's malware allowing the hacker access into the user's iPhone. But government employees don't have to worry about the security vulnerability since they aren't allowed, yet, to buy one for work.

An increasing number of local governments are getting into the business of providing Wi-Fi service to residents who want to access the Internet throughout a city or county. About 385 cities, communities, and counties in the United States have a wireless networking project, with most intended partially or wholly for residential use, according to a recently released report by Forrester Research. (Requires a subscription.)

But Forrester researcher Sally Cohen questions if the investment is worth the cost. Only 27 percent of all U.S. online households use Wi-Fi, and the majority of these users (76 percent) connect to a private Wi-Fi service in their home, not to a municipal or county network provided in, say, parks, libraries, commercial areas or other hot spots.

To make wireless networks a better investment, Cohen advises local governments to do some homework. This includes determining what percentage of residents want a wireless service, how much they may be willing to pay for certain services available on the network, if other services can piggyback on the network such as remote parking payment systems and traffic control video surveillance, and educating residents abut Wi-Fi to increase usage.

The Forrester report, however, doesn't discuss the controversy of local governments providing what telecommunications companies argue is a business that government has no place competing with the private sector.

Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., issued a statement today calling on the private sector and academia to come up with ideas to reduce the cost of the 2010 decennial census, including technologies that may keep costs in check. Coburn has been critical of the Census Bureau's decision not to use the Internet for the decennial census. The Census Bureau estimates the 2010 Census will be $11.5 billion, which is an increase of $200 million from an estimate it had been quoting just a couple of months ago.

According to the statement:

The Census Bureau’s reluctance to employ new methods and online tools goes against the grain of common sense. If we can collect taxes online from any tax filers, surely we can count every American quickly, inexpensively and accurately,” Dr. Coburn said.

At a hearing this afternoon of the Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management (FFM), the Census Bureau will announce that the most recent cost of the next census is estimated to be at least $11.5 billion.

The Census Bureau has developed and is testing handheld computers as a way to reduce costs, as I wrote about for Government Executive Magazine this month. But much of the savings from the handhelds ($445 million) that the bureau is banking on has mostly been overtaken by rising costs, which are expected to continue to rise as we move closer to the 2010 census, according to the General Accountability Office.

Sharing information within agencies -- much less among agencies -- has been hampered by systems that are not compatible. Still, policymakers say a free and secure flow of information is the key element in better managing government and producing better policies and public services.

Integrating these systems, which have incompatible protocols, security and data management systems, has proven to be an intractable problem. But Microsoft, Cisco and EMC have founded "an alliance of technology vendors that will offer one of the most comprehensive, security-enhanced, commercial, multi-vendor, end-to-end information-sharing technology architectures for helping protect and share sensitive government information," according to a statement released yesterday by the Secure Information Sharing Architecture (SISA) Alliance, the name of the new group.

According to a ComputerWorld article:

Cisco will lend its network protection and secure virtualized network links capabilities, EMC will provide its networked storage systems and information life cycle management tools, and Microsoft will add its identity management software and its expertise in client systems and operating systems, the executives said.

The other vendors include Liquid Machines Inc., which will provide content protection expertise, Swan Island Networks Inc., which specializes in trusted computing environments, and Titus Labs, a provider of e-mail and document classification tools.

The alliance gave no details on spending or contracts related to the effort.

Not too many stock analysts cover the federal government information technology sector. Not sure why, given federal government IT spending tops about $100 billion, when including the unreported "black budgets" in the intelligence agencies.

But maybe times are changing. Gregory Wowkun, a securities analyst with Banc of America, just started covering the federal government IT sector, according to an Associated Press article. Wowkun's initial rating for the group: "neutral." Yawn.

Wowkun argues that spending on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars will draw funds for IT modernization from other agencies. Still, Wowkun had some buy recommendations, including SI International Inc. and SRA International.

This shouldn't come as too surprising:

Schools are not adequately protecting students either in cyberspace or in their buildings, and more money is needed to improve the situation, according to a report released by a leading government supplier of IT products and services.

In a survey of 381 school districts, CDW-G found that schools tend to rely too heavily on technology to protect students from cyberthreats. Out of a possible 110 points on the CDW-G cyber safety index, CDW-G gave districts an average score of 55.3. On the positive side, most districts monitor students' Internet activity, block Web sites and place computer monitors in view of adults. On the negative side, fewer than two out of five districts close their network to provide more control over communication and content access (although many students know how to circumvent the networks by using proxy sites), only about a third update their acceptable use policies once a year (an unacceptable trend now that social networking sites such as Facebook are available), and only 8 percent of districts provide cyber safety training to students, such as including awareness training on identity theft and "the potential impact that inappropriate content can have on a student's college and career plans," according to an accompanying press release.

As for physical security, districts scored an average of 44 out of a possible 160 points. While 63 percent of districts use security cameras to scan school property, "only 24 percent of districts report having real-time access to sex offender databases," according to the report.

CDW-G reports that half of all districts say that a tight security and IT budget is the primary barrier to improving security. CDW-G, not surprisingly, offers this advice: "The School Safety Index can help IT and security directors make the case for additional funding by helping district leaders understand the tools and resources that may prevent or mitigate security breaches, thereby lessening the long-term impact that a breach can have on a district. CDW-G also recommends that districts turn to peers and the vendor community to understand their options regarding new security technology and best practices."

More money may be the answer, but citing a vendor report may make school information security managers' argument for a bigger budget actually a tougher sell to the school board.

Government contractor Harris Corp. plans to buy computer-services company Multimax, based in Reston, Va., for $400 million. Harris Corp. has contracts throughout the federal government, including a $600 million contract to provide the U.S. Census Bureau with handheld computers that enumerators will use in the upcoming 2010 census. Multimax has computer services contracts with the Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, Army, Department of Homeland Security, Department of State and other federal agencies.

In what has been characterized as an ironic twist, Computer Sciences Corp., the prime contractor working on modernizing the IRS’ computer systems, announced yesterday that it had found "significant errors" in its own tax accounting over a period from 2000 to 2006, according to a Forbes report. CSC will take a $300 million to $400 million charge to fix the problem. CSC’s stock dropped 2.3 percent on the news.

It was just a matter of time before Google and the tough privacy laws in the European Union bumped heads. An independent European Union panel has sent a letter to Google asking it to address numerous concerns, including storing personal data of its users for up to two years, the Associated Press reported Friday. The EU has some of the strictest privacy laws on the books, much more so than U.S. privacy laws. Google's privacy officer says Google stores user information to protect it from hackers.

The head of a group of tax preparers who provide free tax-preparation services under an IRS program sent a letter yesterday to members of the Senate Finance Committee complaining about the IRS' plans to create an agency web site that will offer the same service, according to a press release issued by the Free File Alliance.

In the letter, Tim Hugo, executive director of the alliance, which provides tax-preparation and electronic-filing services for low-to-moderate income families under an agreement with the IRS, wrote, "If Congress enacts the web portal proposal, it would abrogate the current agreement between the Free File Alliance and the IRS. Per the terms of that Agreement, the Alliance would dissolve and cease to be an entity providing free Income Tax Returns and electronic filing to millions of Americans."

Hugo argues that the IRS web portal would make the government a direct and subsidized competitor to the private companies. Alliance members include H&R Block and Intuit's Turbo Tax. Families with adjusted gross incomes of $52,000 a year are eligible to take part in the Free File program. The Free File Alliance prepared and filed taxes for 20 million Americans this past tax season.

Congress and the IRS are concerned that hidden fees and the poor quality of tax preparation services offered to Free File customers is holding back e-filing of taxes and is driving the government to consider building an IRS web portal for tax filing. "If the tax preparation industry cannot provide free basic filing services without hidden costs and traps, perhaps it is time to consider having the IRS provide a direct filing portal to enable all taxpayers to file electronically without cost," wrote Sens. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, then chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, and Max Baucus, D-Mont., then the committee's ranking member, in a November 2006 letter to IRS Commissioner Mark Everson.

Most taxpayers using Free File must pay a fee to have their taxes electronically filed to the IRS, and alliance members make money by providing other services.

The following item was posted by Bob Brewin

Vultures can stay aloft a long time without expending a lot of energy by riding thermals. So it makes sense that the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has code named a program to develop an aircraft that can stay airborne for five years “The Vulture Air Vehicle Program.”

DARPA, the Pentagon's research arm, released a solicitation notice Wednesday that asks industry to provide ideas for developing a 1,000-pound aircraft that can stay aloft for five years with a 99 percent-plus probability.

DARPA did not define the mission of the aircraft, but it probably includes using it as a way to gather signals intelligence or as a photo reconnaissance platform.

The research agency appears open to almost any idea that will help it achieve this goal but did rule out any aircraft powered by radiology or those that use any form of buoyant flight. That rules out blimps or dirigibles.

Based on the limited amount of information in the solicitation notice, DARPA appears to be leaning towards an electric aircraft which derives its energy from solar or fuel cells or a remotely refueled airplane. DARPA said,

architectures selected and the specific approaches taken by the Offerors will determine the range of technical areas that are developed, including, but not limited to, environmental energy collection, high specific energy storage, extremely efficient propulsion systems, precision robotic refueling, autonomous materiel transfer, extremely efficient vehicle structural design, and mitigation of environmentally-induced loads.

The electric powered option makes AeroEnvironment Inc., based in Monrovia, Calif., a likely candidate for the job. The company developed its “Helios” fuel and solar-cell powered flying wing for NASA, which in 2001 set an unofficial altitude record for a non-rocket powered aircraft of 96,863 feet. (View image.) The Helios developed structural problems on a test flight off the Hawaiian island of Kauai and crashed on a test flight in 2003.

Another likely bidder for the DARPA Vulture is Scaled Composites Inc., Mojave, Calif., headed by Burt Rutan, who flew around the word in 1986 in one of the company’s aircraft without refueling. (View image.)

Neither AeroEnvironment nor Scaled Composites responded to a query from Tech Insider by deadline. DARPA also could not comment by deadline.

DARPA wants anyone with a good idea for the Vulture project to soar into industry day planned for June 7 at the Westin Arlington Gateway, Fitzgerald Ballroom (2nd Floor), 801 N. Glebe Road Arlington, Va. Just follow the circling birds.

Government workers aren't the only individuals who lose laptops, hard drives and computer tapes containing personal information. Private-sector employees, even those working for companies hired to protect personal data, do too, as IBM recently experienced. The company announced this week that it had lost tapes containing personal information including Social Security numbers for an undisclosed number of current and former IBM employees.

The loss is particularly uncomfortable for IBM, because, as ComputerWorld points out in an article on the loss, IBM lost the "personal employee data even though parts of its business and solutions portfolio are dedicated to securing and protecting that very type of private data for customers."

Still, that doesn't stop the public from complaining loudly and sharply about government agencies' failure to protect personal data. A case in point is a recent USA Today opinion piece, which Tech Insider linked to in a post. The article prompted one reader to comment, "Reading comments on a USA Today article should be mandatory for federal managers, so each can understand the proportion of USA Today readers who detest government and government employees."

State government contractor Affiliated Computer Services Inc. has some ambitious growth plans. The provider of information technology outsourcing services for governments and the private sector announced yesterday that it would double its revenue to $10 billion by 2010, according to an Associated Press article.

Much of the growth, said Lynn Blodgett, ACS chief executive officer, would come from selling more to government. The last time ACS appeared on Government Executive's Top 50 IT Contractor's list was in 2004, when the company had $481 million in sales. That was good enough for 15th on the list. It sold its federal business to Lockheed Martin in 2003, so now its growth in government sales must come from its state and local government business.

ACS announced yesterday "it won a five-year deal worth $19.6 million from the Texas Health and Human Services Commission to provide call-center services to families receiving food stamps and other assistance," according to the AP.

"ACS reported $5.3 billion in revenue in 2006, a 23 percent increase over the previous year," the AP added.

Is Oracle taking over the world? It’s not so much a stretch to think so. Oracle has bought application competitors such as PeopleSoft and Siebel during a buying spree that ended last year.

But the database, middleware and application company is out to reassure customers, and investors, that the purchases were worth it. The company plans to launch in 2008 a new Java-based application suite called “Fusion” (from which it is taking the best of Oracle, Siebel, PeopleSoft and JD Edwards functionality). But it won’t stop supporting the other brands’ software as stand-alone entities. That’s what Mark Johnson, Oracle Public Sector senior vice president, tells Tech Insider. He also promises no forced upgrades, a continued stream of enhancements, and no internally-competing application development teams.

Johnson says Oracle sees the most growth potential in selling middleware – application servers, service-oriented architecture and such. Applications come second, and databases, the technology that launched Oracle in the late 1970s, in third place. It makes sense – databases are a mature product.

But what about the big question: Who’s going to replace Oracle chief Larry Ellison, whenever he chooses to step down? Johnson notes that the Ellison has two co-presidents reporting to him, Safra Catz (also the chief financial officer) and Charles Phillips. Johnson has been at Oracle for 19 years.

Computer Sciences Corp. announced today that it is part of the Verizon Business team that won one of three contracts under the federal government's Networx Universal telecommunications program, according to an article posted by TMCnet. CSC says it will provide "customer-specific network design support and engineering services, managed tiered security services and anti-virus managed services, which provide detection and removal of system viruses," according to the article.

In another sign of the growing business of information technology outsourcing, Computer Sciences Corp. announced that it has agreed to purchase systems integrator and consulting firm Covansys Corp. for $1.3 billion.

Of Convansys' 9,000 employees, 6,400 are based in India, which leads the world in providing outsourcing IT services. The purchase doubles CSC's workforce in India.

Most of Convansys' business is in the financial services industry, but it also has offerings in telecommunications, health care, and it performs application development and software testing.

Hat tip: webwereld

The Justice Department is joining whistleblower suits against Hewlett-Packard, Accenture, and Sun Microsystems, alleging the companies favored technology companies in exchange for kickbacks.

The three companies “submitted false claims to the United States for information technology hardware and services on numerous government contracts from the late 1990s to the present,” according to a Justice release. The suit was unsealed Thursday.

The suit contends that the three companies received payments, often in the form of rebates from more than three dozen IT vendors (including Cisco, Microsoft, IBM, Dell, and Oracle), which agreed to push their products. Justice claims that any discounts or rebates the companies offered should have been passed on to the government, InfoWorld reports.

“For example, Accenture received more than $735,000 in payments from IBM for ‘favorable treatment and influence’ on six government contracts between 2001 and 2006, the DOJ filing alleges,” InfoWorld notes.

Former Qwest chieftain Joseph Nacchio is guilty of 19 counts of insider trading.

Nacchio was on trial in Denver federal court for 42 counts of insider trading. The jury found him not guilty on 23 counts. The former chief executive officer sold $100.8 million worth of Qwest stock in 2001 just before the company's shares dropped.

Each guilty count carries a maximum 10-year sentence and a $1 million fine. Nacchio will be sentenced on July 27. The court also could claim Nacchio’s assets in forfeiture, the amount to be determined by a federal judge at a different date. Nacchio was released on bond.

Nacchio’s defense rested in significant part on an argument that Qwest CEO had access to classified information about big national-security-related federal contracts that he thought Qwest would win.

But, according to a Justice Department release, Nacchio’s indictment specifically states that “Nacchio knew that Qwest’s 2001 financial targets were overly aggressive, that Qwest did not have a good track record in growing recurring revenue, that the company’s business units were underperforming, and that there would be insufficient non-recurring revenue sources to close the gap between Qwest’s publicly stated financial targets and its actual performance. It further states that Nacchio was specifically warned about this information.”

Austin Yerks, president of Computer Sciences Corporation's Defense Integrated Solutions and Services division, has been named the president of CSC's new Defense Division. In his new role, "Yerks will provide executive leadership and strategic direction for the company's Department of Defense business," according to a CSC press release. "The division, which comprises more than 8,000 employees, supports all of CSC's DOD clients, including the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force and defense agencies."

Yerks will report to James W. Sheaffer, president of CSC's North American Public Sector business unit.

CSC also named David Browder vice president of business development for its North American Public Sector (formerly called the Federal Sector) business unit's Defense Division. Browder will be responsible for managing teams pursuing government contracts that support DOD. Browder "most recently served as the acting vice president for Federal Sector's Strategic Business Management organization, responsible for managing new business opportunities and proposal development operations." accord to a CSC press release.

CDW Corp., the parent company of government vendor CDWG, is having a big week on Wall Street. Thanks to an announcement by company officials that they expect to release a report of higher-than-expected first-quarter revenue, the stock jumped late last week about $5 a share to around $67 a share. CDW plans to announce its first quarter results April 24, according to bloggingstocks.com. No details on whether its government business has been better than average. However, CDW comes in fairly low (No. 34) on Government Executive's Top 50 Technology Contractors list.

Federal systems integrator CGI Group Inc. could be facing charges of conflict of interest in a $400 million (Canadian) contract it won from Public Works and Government Services of Canada, according to an article in the Ottawa Sun newspaper.

CGI has dozens of contracts with state and local governments in the United States, as well as U.S. federal agencies, including the General Services Administration, which hired CGI to build and maintain its Pegasys system, which integrates more than 4,000 users nationwide and processes more than 40 million transactions annually, according to CGI's 2006 annual report.

TPG Technology Consulting, based in Ottawa, has asked the Public Sector Integrity Office in Canada to investigate the computer support contract because Canadian Public Works Minister Michael Fortier had worked for CGI as the primary investment banker to sell a $330 million CGI stock offering in 2004. At the time, Fortier headed up the Montreal office of Credit Suisse.

Fortier denies any conflict of interest and argues he and his staff do not award Public Works contracts.

Nevertheless, "TPG president Don Powell says his firm ... was the low bidder for the support work," according to the article. "He maintains that public servants involved in the process told him that the technical evaluations were “very close.” TGP vows to take the case to court to stop work on the contract.

The U.S. federal attorney's office and CA Inc. officials aren't saying whether they’ll pursue legal action against CA founder Charles Wang for alleged accounting fraud, InfoWorld reports.

A CA board report released last week accuses Wang, who stepped down as the company’s chief executive officer in 2002, of accounting fraud that led to a steep decline in the company’s stock. Wang’s successor, Sanjay Kumar starts this month a 12-year sentence in federal prison and has agreed to pay restitution to stockholders.

The board report recommended suing Wang for damages, but CA didn't comment on its plans, in the InfoWorld article. Likewise, the “U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York also had no comment on whether it was pursuing charges against Wang,” the article states.

Norman Berle, a criminal defense lawyer who teaches white-collar crime at Fordham University's business school, says a civil action against Wang is likely, but that a criminal action by the federal attorney is less likely.

A culture of corruption pervaded the security software company and government contractor CA Inc. almost from its inception, according to a report issued by the company's corporate board Thursday.

According to the report, founder and former CEO Charles Wang oversaw “accounting fraud lasting more than a decade at the software company,” once known as Computer Associates, reports The New York Times.

CA, which makes network management software, was 46th on Government Executive’s list of top 2005 federal technology contractors. It captured $117,763,017 worth of federal contracts in fiscal 2004, or 0.25 percent of the federal technology market. CA did not rank in the top 50 during fiscal 2005.

Wang’s successor, Sanjay Kumar was sentenced to12 years in a federal prison and agreed last week to pay $800 million in restitution to stockholders who lost money when it was revealed the company overstated earnings.

Wang has not been indicted, but the CA board charges he “masterminded accounting gimmicks that led his company to report inflated sales and profits,” the Times reports. CA “is still struggling to rebuild the trust of employees and shareholders, the report says. ...'Fraud pervaded the entire CA organization at every level, and was embedded in CA’s culture, as instilled by Mr. Wang, almost from the company’s inception,' according to the CA board."

In a statement, Wang called the report "fallacious" and blamed Kumar for the company's woes.

The U.S. Holocaust Museum and Google Earth have teamed up to bring satellite map images of the effects of the atrocities in the Darfur region of the Sudan, the Associated Press reported yesterday.

Holocaust Museum and Google Earth executives say the project, called the Crisis in Darfur, will bring the acts of what many believe is genocide into the homes, offices and on computer screens worldwide to emphasize the violence in hopes of building support to end it. Users can zoom into villages to see burnt houses, and into refugee camps to view the crowded conditions. Photographs, statistics and eyewitness testimony are also included. Google Earth has more than 200 million users.

According to the Holocaust Museum's web site, "Crisis in Darfur is the first project of the museum’s Genocide Prevention Mapping Initiative that will over time include information on potential genocides allowing citizens, governments, and institutions to access information on atrocities in their nascent stages and respond."

The CEO of an electronics supplier charged with exporting U.S. defense technology with missile applications to India pleaded not guilty Tuesday, the Associated Press reports.

Parthasarathy Sudarshan, an Indian national who heads Cirrus Electronics, is being held at least until Thursday when he faces a bail hearing. “Prosecutors said he worked closely with Indian government officials to ship heat-resistant memory chips, microprocessors and other equipment to prohibited government agencies,” the AP reports. Also arrested was Indian national Mythili Gopal, the company's international sales manager; he faces an April 17 court date. In addition, two Cirrus employees in Singapore were indicted.

“The FBI says all items were exported in violation of the U.S. arms export control act and has accused two unidentified Indian government officials - including one posted at the Indian Embassy in Washington - of being part of the conspiracy,” reports CNN-IBN, a 24-hour India news network broadcast in English.

The Indian Express reports that the official Indian government response has been minimalist. “We are looking into the allegations. Now they are only allegations...we will get back to you when we have something to say about it,” the newspaper quotes Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon as saying.

Looks like long-awaited word on the award of the multibillion-dollar Networx federal telecommunications contract is finally coming. There will be an "announcement tomorrow morning" on the contract, according to the GSA press office.

The Justice Department today sealed its first criminal conviction of a major defense contractor under a law that forbids companies to export sensitive military technology, and collecting a $100 million fine from the company for doing so, according to a Justice Department press release.

For violating the Arms Export Control Act, ITT Corp., a leading manufacturer of night-vision equipment for the U.S. military, will pay a $2 million fine, will forfeit $28 million to the federal government, and must pay an additional $50 million or invest that amount in research and development of new advanced night-vision technology. ITT also will pay a $20 million fine to the State Department.

The company was charged with sending classified technical specifications to night-goggle component manufacturers in Singapore, the People’s Republic of China and the United Kingdom. ITT also lost track of “numerous pieces of state-of-the-art night vision equipment” and then attempted to mislead the State Department, according to Justice.

As a result of the misleading statements, ITT paid an $8 million penalty in 2004, but did not admit any wrongdoing. This time, however, Justice says ITT will consent to a plea agreement to be filed in U.S. District Court in Roanoke, Va., in which company officials plead guilty to one count each of exporting defense articles without a license and omission of statements of material facts in arms exports reports.

U.S. attorneys argued that U.S. night-vision technology is superior to other nations' technology, giving it "an enormous advantage on the battlefield," and sending the technology overseas "threatens our national security in the most direct way." To read what advancements in night-vision-goggle technology that a U.S. company has made, click on "Night-Vision Goggles Now in Color."

The federal government has given permission to Intel Corp. to build a $2.5 billion chip-manufacturing facility in China, the company's first large facility in Asia, the New York Times reports.

“Intel’s facility, which is scheduled to open in 2010, probably will not give away any big secrets,” the Times states. The facility “will produce only so-called chip sets, or chips that work to support microprocessors. Intel officials say they will not produce the company’s core technology here, the powerful microprocessing chips.”

The federal government regulates the export of advanced technology through the International Traffic in Arms Regulations.

It's no secret that government agencies and the contractors that work for them find it hard to attract young workers with information technology skills. Another reminder of just why appeared in an article in today's Washington Post.

The newspaper interviews Michael Gagnon, a 23-year-old George Mason University student who works at a Fairfax, Va., research lab, about job opportunities he is considering. Although the Post cites stats that show the Washington, D.C., area as a haven for IT workers, halfway through the article Gagnon talks about how he is likely to turn down the many software development and programming jobs he has been offered in Washington (the jobs "bore him," he says) in favor of a job-scholarship package at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he can focus on information security. Gagnon says his classmates, who also are sifting through many job offers from local companies, are considering leaving because "they are also looking for 'more innovative work,'" the Post quotes Gagnon saying. "I don't think people like me will stay here if they aren't offered as stimulating opportunities as there are elsewhere," Gagnon told the Post.

For years, the federal government has found it a challenge to attract and keep young talent because of varying reasons, threatening federal programs and the innovation needed to support them. The Washington Monthly reported on some of those reasons back in 2000.

General Services Administration chief Lurita Doan yesterday said GSA would award the massive governmentwide telecommunciations contract, Networx, in "the next few days" but don't expect the award today.

A GSA spokesman said the Networx contract will not be released today, but he added that he could not rule out the possibility that GSA would award the contract this weekend.