Tech Group: Help Us Boost Federal Cybersecurity

Have a practical idea for improving the government’s cybersecurity? This trade group wants to know.

The American Council for Technology and Industry Advisory Council (ACT-IAC), a public-private partnership that works to improve government by fostering the strategic use of information technology, has launched a new crowdsourcing campaign aimed at addressing a variety of issues facing the federal government’s tech infrastructure.

“Today, as the nation is facing more security breaches than ever before, it is vital that government and industry executives work together to strengthen the government’s cybersecurity posture,” ACT-IAC Executive Director Kenneth Allen said in a news release  (opens in a new tab).

The Cybersecurity Innovation Initiative is seeking help from those in academia, government, and industry—and even from the general public. (However, ACT-IAC is not asking vendors for specific product pitches and will not endorse any product or service.)

After gathering all comments, the organization will put together a report outlining the solutions to the challenges presented by the initiative.

“We’re really hoping that the ideas that come in are across the board—technical, operational, managerial, perhaps R&D-oriented,” IAC Executive Vice Chair David McClure told Federal Times  (opens in a new tab). “We’re really suggesting to the respondents that they open the door to thinking about what can be done to advance the operational security of the federal government.”

The initiative comes after a period when the federal government took some drastic steps to help solve its lingering cybersecurity troubles—including holding a 30-day “cybersecurity sprint”  (opens in a new tab) to help fix bugs in the federal infrastructure and temporarily shutting down a key web platform used to approve security clearances. The government’s actions followed unprecedented data breaches at the Office of Personnel Management that affected an estimated 21.5 million people  (opens in a new tab) and led to calls for tougher protections for federal employees.

Those interested in submitting ideas have until August 28 to post them on the ACT-IAC Cybersecurity Innovation Initiative website  (opens in a new tab), where they can also vote on their favorite entries from other creative problem solvers.

(iStock/Thinkstock)