The FISMA Focus IPD

From: AsiaPacific FutureGov

As US Federal Agencies plan to fully deploy the ‘big five’ technologies in the next two years, they are gearing up their networks for the resulting additional capacity and complexity in order to avoid network bottlenecks.

According to a report, based on a survey of 200 Federal network managers and underwritten by network solutions provider, Brocade, the implementation of the ‘big five’ – mobility, security, big data, cloud computing and data centre consolidation – will have significant impact on existing network capacity.

As these initiatives are implemented, the agencies should pay attention to security risks, bandwidth limitation, network latency and storage limitations, states the report.

Network managers expect agencies’ total network load to increase by 79 per cent on average as a result of these five technologies. 59 per cent of them feel that if these were fully deployed today, they would be at or exceed the networks’ capacities.

Some of the agencies have already begun to strengthen the foundation of their networks. 43 per cent of the network managers have taken steps to improve security, while 46 per cent have plans to do the same. Agencies have also taken steps to improve network policies, increase bandwidth, increase openness and adherence to open standards, and reduce network latency.

In the next two years, network managers expect to modernise almost half of the infrastructure at their agencies. Infrastructure requirements of 12 per cent of the agencies are ready for the ‘big five’.

45 per cent of the agencies are using the budget process to prioritise and pace the implementation of each initiative. Network managers request clear prioritisation from the leadership, standardised documentation of infrastructure requirements, structured coordination of all initiatives, wider consultation with leadership and more ownership.

Given the direction of government IT today, it is evident that networks are one of the main pillars of IT delivery in government agencies. It is important to ensure that networks are robust enough to handle increasing traffic and modernised to open standards.