Trump calls for a "sweeping transformation" of government IT systems during White House...

[midian182]

Another meeting between Donald Trump and some of the tech industry’s top CEOs took place yesterday. The inaugural gathering of the American Technology Council saw the president call for a “sweeping transformation of the federal government’s technology.”

Trump signed an executive order in May that established the council, which was created to modernize the government’s technological systems, cut costs, and improve services.

“Government needs to catch up with the technology revolution,” said Trump. “America should be the global leader in government technology just as we are in every other aspect, and we are going to start our big edge again in technology – such an important industry.”

CEOs from firms such as Adobe, Akamai, Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Intel, Microsoft, Oracle, Palantir, and Qualcomm were in attendance, along with investors such as Peter Thiel, who was one of the few Silicon Valley execs to show support for Trump during his presidential campaign.

Nadella, Cook get seats flanking @POTUS at tech council pic.twitter.com/wHgA1azHMw

— Kayla Tausche (@kaylatausche) June 19, 2017

One notable absentee was Facebook. While it was COO Sheryl Sandberg, rather than Mark Zuckerberg, who represented the company at December’s meeting with Trump, the social network sent no representatives to yesterday’s summit. It did receive an invitation, but the firm blamed “scheduling conflicts” for its absence. Former advisers Travis Kalanick, on a leave of absence following the death of his mother, and Elon Musk, who promised to quit Trump’s councils in protest against leaving the Paris Agreement, were also missing.

Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, highlighted some of the outdated systems still used by the government, including parts of the Pentagon that rely on floppy disks, and over 6000 decades-old datacenters maintained by federal agencies.

pic.twitter.com/7BEZ3jMhyS

— Tony Romm (@TonyRomm) June 19, 2017

“Together we will unleash the creativity of the private sector to provide citizen services in a way that has never happened before,” said Kushner, before the session began.

Recode reports that many of those in attendance were pushing their own agendas. Amazon's Jeff Bezos called on the government to take advantage of the type of commercial technology his company sells. Palantir CEO Alex Carp spoke about how big data could help stop fraudulent federal spending. And Tim Cook said that the US should make coding a requirement in schools. The Apple CEO also talked about the importance of immigration, encryption, human rights, and serving veterans through medical care and hiring policies.

More meetings are scheduled during the White House’s “tech week,” including one that will cover drones this Thursday and the announcement of “additional tech reforms at the Department of Veterans Affairs on Friday.”

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https://www.techspot.com/news/69784-trump-calls-sweeping-transformation-government-systems-during-white.html

 

[Uncle Al]

Well, it's common knowledge that SOME government computer systems are more than a little outdated. NORAD is a good example with systems that have barely been updated since the late 50's. While other systems like the IRS tend to be a lot more modern, thus bilking the taxpayers remains more important than protecting the nation .....

 

[IAMTHESTIG]

There is also a cost to being on the "bleeding edge" as well... Especially with new software that uses the customers as beta testers, which seems to be fairly standard practice for some developers. That being said, floppy disks are terribly unreliable and I'm sure there is plenty of money being wasted to keep old crap running.

 

[mbrowne5061]

Well, it's common knowledge that SOME government computer systems are more than a little outdated. NORAD is a good example with systems that have barely been updated since the late 50's. While other systems like the IRS tend to be a lot more modern, thus bilking the taxpayers remains more important than protecting the nation .....

Honestly, I would rather they keep the floppy disk systems. Kinda. You can't break something if you don't try to fix it when its not broken. The NORAD systems still pass their tests, and they've gotten so old that "security through obsuricty" is starting to become a major factor. Sure, a foreign agent sitting at the terminal for one of those computer could probably do some serious damage - but that would be true for a brand-new state-of-the-art system too. At least with such an old system, a remote hack becomes less likely, even a Stuxnet "leave enough infected removable media laying around until one of them makes their way onto the air-gapped system" is unlikely seeing as these systems are probably using something like punch cards or 8" floppies.

 

[Hexic]

“additional tech reforms at the Department of Veterans Affairs on Friday.”

How about a general VA reform while we're at it?

The VA: Giving veterans a second chance to die for their country since 1930.

 

[Raoul Duke]

From the article "Recode reports that many of those in attendance were pushing their own agendas" mentioning Amazon, Apple CEO, and Palantir. This is the problem, no one gives a **** anymore about their country, it's all grab all you can and keep what you can get. Any civic mindedness seems to have long since evaporated. Until people do the right thing because it is the right thing nothing will change. Granted there are contentious issues, but reasonable people can work through these
the other option is we continue with this unsustainable consumer culture, the people not in it will continue to desperately try to get in it and eventually there will be so many of us that a resource war, pollution, or some other such **** will kill us all. And no, we won't be escaping to Mars or somewhere else. There are so many people on this planet all grasping for first world style prosperity that IMHO we are at some kind of tipping point. One thing is sure, if we continue in the future the way we have in the past it'll be amazing if any of us survive.

 

[davislane1]

From the article "Recode reports that many of those in attendance were pushing their own agendas" mentioning Amazon, Apple CEO, and Palantir. This is the problem, no one gives a **** anymore about their country, it's all grab all you can and keep what you can get. Any civic mindedness seems to have long since evaporated.

Many of these folks were educated in schools that teach that a 'nation' is little more than a well-armed sugar daddy. It is no surprise they care more about government cheese than the entity it is supposed to govern.

 

[BadThad]

It's good see our federal government finally on track taking care of things that REALLY matter instead of stupid social justice crap Odummy kept pushing. Glad to see the purging of the worst president in history and his worthless agenda!