The General Services Administration (GSA) on Aug. 22 issued a new task order request as part of a cyber security program managed by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that helps federal civilian agencies enhance their cyber defenses.
The task order request applies to all four phases of the Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation (CDM) program with proposals due by Sept. 21.
The Dynamic and Evolving Federal Enterprise Network Defense (DEFEND) Group B request provides support to the DHS CDM program office by enhancing or providing cyber solutions to a number of federal agencies and their components, including the Executive Office of the President Office of Management and Budget, the Departments of Agriculture, Energy, Interior, Transportation, and Veterans Affairs, and the Office of Personnel Management.
These agencies were covered under a previous task order awarded in 2016 for CDM Continuous Monitoring as a Service.
The four phases of the CDM program are aimed providing tools to departments and agencies to help them know what is on their networks, who is on the networks, what is happening on the networks, and how their data is protected.
According to GSA’s DEFEND Group B request, some of the scope and objectives include provisioning agencies with CDM approved products, filling gaps in existing CDM solutions to achieve common capabilities, integrating, implementing and maintaining new tools into agency-level CDM dashboards, reducing threat surface by strengthening the security of information technology assets, providing “advantageous” price discounts for cyber tools and capabilities, and provide flexible services for dynamic threat environments.
DHS is planning acquisition activities for DEFEND Group A, which is for the department, and Groups C, D and E for 17 Chief Financial Officer Act agencies with plans to release task order requests over the next six months.