Cybersecurity

Why the cybersecurity industry is failing government

You’d think that after years (if not decades) of government IT professionals urging the vendor community to understand agency missions before trying to sell products into the federal market, that technology companies would be doing a better job of making their products mission-ready. And yet, any time you get a couple of federal IT pros together in the same room, the song remains the same.

At an IT summit late last year, government panelists complained of how technology companies still try to force-fit their commercial applications into the federal space. Vendors, these executives said, still don’t understand specific agency requirements, agencies’ mandates to share information securely across platforms or even the basic qualifications required to be compliant with federal technology initiatives such as the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program known as FedRAMP.

For many on the agency side, enough is getting to be too much. It’s not that these buyers aren’t interested in products tested first in the commercial marketplace – to the contrary, that’s clearly the buying trend in government. But if you are just trying to expand your market share by treating the government as just another customer, save your time. Many of the summit panelists said flat-out that a lack of mission knowledge is a deal-breaker for product purchases.