Investments

The Modernizing Government Technology Act requires OMB to provide quarterly updates on projects recommended for funding by the TMF Board. Through the ongoing Board oversight process, project information will be regularly updated on this page. Below are the current public* projects, including project-specific descriptions and the information necessary to meet statutory requirements.

*Details on classified projects are not included below. If you have questions about a classified project, please contact tmf@gsa.gov.

The American Rescue Plan (ARP)

The American Rescue Plan provided $1 billion in TMF funds to address urgent IT modernization challenges, bolster cybersecurity defenses, and respond to the COVID-19 crisis. The TMF Board has prioritized funding projects that cut across agencies, address immediate security gaps, and improve the public’s ability to access services.

These investments are directly responsive to the president’s Executive Order on Improving the Nation’s Cybersecurity, and include funding the transformation of three critical agencies in the executive branch. These projects aim to strengthen the security of data and privacy protections for 2M civilian federal employees whose data is housed in the Office of Personnel Management’s systems, the over 100M students and borrowers the Department of Education supports, and hundreds of facilities under the control of the General Services Administration.

With Login.gov and MAX.gov, these investments will transform authentication for the federal government through shared services, providing for easy multi-factor authentication and an improved experience for millions of users. These investments are also directly responsive to the COVID-19 pandemic that has fundamentally changed how the federal government operates and interacts with the public. MAX.gov aims to improve interagency cooperation and communication, which is critical in a remote and hybrid environment, and the Department of Homeland Security aims to address issues uncovered by moving paper processes digitally and streamlining communications between agencies, improving their ability to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic.

List of ARP Investments

• Securing and Modernizing the Registration Number System (FTC)
• Protecting Aviation Consumers and Streamlining Regulated Entity Interactions Through Human-Centered Design (DOT)
• Digitizing Forms and Personalizing Experiences for Better Veterans Benefits Management and Customer Support (VA)
• Securing Data Availability and Integrity (EPA)
• Enhancing Security of DOL Data and Applications (DOL)
• Digitizing Records for Easier Public Access (DOI-BLM)
• Improving CX with Digital Content Delivery (NTSB)
• Securing Public Health Information with Mature Zero Trust (HHS-OIG)
• Improving Mission Support with Modernized Applications (DOT-FAA)
• Personal Data Security for Public Benefits Processing (SSA)
• Improving IT Security with Zero Trust Architecture (USAGM)
• Secure Cloud National Intelligence Sharing (Treasury)
• Citizen-Centric Online Self-Services (RRB)
• Project Campfire (USAID)
• Development of the Next Generation Procurement List Information Management System (PLIMS) 2.0 (AbilityOne)
• Identity Credential Access Management (ICAM) Modernization for FHA Connection (HUD)
• Website and Digital Modernization (OPM)
• Critical Infrastructure Cyber Protection (DOD-Army)
• PERM Visa Modernization (DOL)
• Grants Management Modernization (AmeriCorps)
• Zero Trust Architecture (USAID)
• Network Modernization (USDANet) (USDA)
• Multi-Cloud Security Operations Center (FTC)
• Information Sharing Modernization (DHS)
• High Value Asset (HVA) Mission Essential Systems (NARA)
• Network Monitoring, Detection, and Response (USDA)
• Veteran Identity Modernization (VA)
• IT Modernization (PRC)
• Registration and Verification Modernization (SSS)
• Zero Trust Networking (OPM)
• Zero Trust Architecture (ED)
• Advancing Zero Trust (GSA)
• Login.gov (GSA)
• Southwest Border Technology Integration Program (DHS)
• MAX.gov Transition (GSA)
• Classified Projects

List of Other Investments

• UNISYS Mainframe Migration (HUD)
• Enterprise Cloud Email (DOE)
• Farmers.gov Customer Experience Portal (USDA)
• Labor Certificate Processing Modernization (DOL)
• Application Modernization Integrating Flexible Architectures (GSA)
• Infrastructure Optimization and Cloud Adoption (USDA)
• NewPay Payroll and Work Schedule and Leave Management Software-as-a-Service (GSA)
• Charge and Case Management System Modernization (EEOC)
• Agricultural Marketing Service Specialty Crops System Modernization (USDA)
• Automated Commercial Environment Collections Module (DHS-CBP)
• Data Modernization (DOL)

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Securing and Modernizing the Registration Number System

The FTC’s project will modernize its Registration Number (RN) System supporting the agency’s consumer protection mission by enforcing rules issued pursuant to the federal Textile Fiber Products Identification Act, the Fur Products Labeling Act, and the Wool Products Labeling Act of 1939. The system issues RNs to U.S.-based businesses to identify who manufactured, imported, distributed, or sold a covered textile, fur, or wool product. Since the inception of the rules, there have been over 168,000 RNs issued.

The first major automated system for RN was built in 1998 using Oracle client-server technologies, incorporating minimal data that FTC had manually maintained prior to the system since the inception of the Act in 1939. The current RN System was developed in 2016 incorporating all data from the previous system. However, the current solution does not conform to FTC’s Zero Trust Architecture and other cyber security best practices. Legacy technology makes the RN System and FTC network less secure and more vulnerable to hackers. Data integrity interference and leakages may greatly impact the FTC mission and potentially consumers.

With TMF funding and support, FTC plans to modernize the RN System by developing a user-friendly cloud application leveraging FTC’s low-code cloud-based Platform as a Service (PaaS) and integrating it with a modern Identity and Access Management (IAM) platform for internal and external users to address the above vulnerabilities. Both platforms are Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) certified and have been used by FTC for other business applications. Phase one of the project will be to develop the new system on FTC’s PaaS to eliminate all vulnerabilities identified with the current system. Phase two will integrate the new system with the customer IAM system to enforce multi-factor authentication to address current single factor authentication weakness. Phase three will migrate all data and deploy the new system into production. The successful outcome of modernizing the RN System includes mitigation of substantial security risks by advancing FTC’s Zero Trust architecture and allowing FTC to decommission the current RN System.

Protecting Aviation Consumers and Streamlining Regulated Entity Interactions Through Human-Centered Design

The DOT’s Office of Aviation Consumer Protection (OACP) project will enhance its consumer complaint and case tracking application used to assist thousands of consumers each year, to gather data published in its monthly Air Travel Consumer Report, and to collect, analyze and store information and data received from airlines, ticket agents, airports, and other stakeholders. OACP’s enhancements to this system will allow OACP to provide better support for air travelers who seek information and assistance, and more effective enforcement of aviation consumer protection requirements. This includes requirements pertaining to non- discrimination, tarmac delays, denied boarding due to oversales, baggage problems, refunds, reimbursements due to flight delays and cancellations, and more. In addition to the air traveling public, approximately 180 U.S. and foreign airlines, thousands of travel agencies, and approximately 340 U.S. airports and other stakeholders that interact with OACP will benefit from an enhanced system.

This funding will help modernize an outdated application developed in 1996. During the COVID-19 pandemic the number of aviation consumer complaints increased dramatically. In 2022, OACP received over 400% more complaints than the average number of complaints received in each of the five years prior to the pandemic. In 2023, OACP is projected to receive a similarly high number of complaints. These complaint numbers highlight the urgent need to develop an enhanced and more efficient system that will better serve consumers, automate certain processing tasks, and provide stronger tools for OACP staff members, streamlining day-to-day operations and increasing efficiency. These improvements will help OACP track and ensure compliance with aviation consumer protection requirements, like the obligation to provide timely refunds or compensation when due.

Leveraging TMF support and using modern programming tools, OACP will improve the consumer and other stakeholders’ experiences through enhancements to streamline and personalize consumer complaint submission, increase automation, and create intuitive tools for analysts and industry users. These enhancements will reduce manual steps, increase analyst efficiency and capacity, and expedite data publication. In addition, corresponding security enhancements will ensure security and privacy protection of aviation consumer data. The TMF investment will allow OACP to work more efficiently and effectively so it can better fulfill its aviation consumer protection mission.

Digitizing Forms and Personalizing Experiences for Better Veterans Benefits Management and Customer Support

Veterans and their families use VA.gov every day to access services such as health care, disability benefits, education, and pension. Many of these services are accessed via forms that are collectively used or downloaded over 2 million times per month. Veterans expect a consistent, excellent experience when they interact with different benefits across the VA. Creating a unified system for digitizing VA forms would reduce burdens for both veterans using paper forms and the VA employees who must process those forms to deliver Veteran benefits.

Many current VA forms require veterans to enter the same information repeatedly and require several systems and VA staff members to process. The path to digitization has been slow and expensive, requiring an estimated average 6 weeks of development time and hundreds of thousands of dollars per form. A backlog of hundreds of forms remains undigitized.

With TMF funding and support, VA will tackle the digitization of forms at scale using a centralized approach with improved personalization and better visualization of key information. This represents a significant step forward in modernizing the user experience by eliminating repetition and making clinical and other decisions easier for VA health care providers, resulting in better health and other veteran benefit outcomes. VA anticipates a 50% or greater reduction in the cost of digitizing a form, which VA estimates to be an average of $500K per form. VA also anticipates a customer savings of 2.5 days per VA customer per form over the effort required by paper forms. Finally, VA expects to reduce custom code by at least 20% which would eliminate the costs of maintaining that code as technical debt, estimated to be $500K per year.

VA will partner closely with the U.S. Web Design System (USWDS) team to follow best practices for the rollout of scalable, multi-agency patterns for use in forms, personalization, and visualizing complex information. VA will also contribute reusable code and research findings back to the USWDS. By partnering with USWDS, the foundational research conducted by VA to create low/no-code form building capabilities will be captured in a format that can be readily scaled and deployed by other agencies that need to address this same problem. The specific improvements include personalized and authenticated patterns; in-context web application (form) personalization; and data visualization.

Securing Data Availability and Integrity

The EPA’s Analytical Radiation Data System (ARadDS) requires significant IT infrastructure modernization and security posture stabilization to minimize risk to the availability and integrity of radiation data important to protecting public health and the environment.

ARadDS requires hardware upgrades, network security remediation, automation and IT tools, a vendor supported Laboratory Information Management System (LIMS), and additional IT skill sets to address the challenges the agency faces in managing and remediating over 3,000 cybersecurity vulnerabilities and implementing network security processes.

With TMF funding and support, EPA will add contractor personnel and resources to modernize an aging infrastructure and bring the program into agency compliance. Using new cybersecurity, network and monitoring tools will allow IT staff to fill gaps created by the current lack of automation and required IT skill sets. Migration to a vendor-supported commercial LIMS solution will allow efficient software support to replace sustaining locally developed applications.

Enhancing Security of DOL Data and Applications

As the DOL addresses key mandates of the nation’s cybersecurity executive order, the agency is enhancing the security of its data and applications through the implementation of an enterprise zero trust architecture. It is critical that DOL protect its millions of stakeholders and secure its digital assets against cyber threats by implementing a trust-based modern architecture, allowing access only to authorized users, in the office, on the road, or at home.

DOL users currently access critical services and data, such as economic reports, retirement plan violation complaints, and worker protections, through a traditional “castle and moat” approach that focuses on external threats and leaves the agency vulnerable to costly insider attacks.

With TMF funding and support, DOL will accelerate the implementation and deployment of a cloud-based security framework, secure access service edge (SASE) solution, to provide connectivity, consistent security, and optimized user experience to its employees, partners, and the public. This solution to mitigate risks associated with its current security approach will be implemented in three major phases: users, applications, and policy. This implementation will enhance the security of DOL IT systems and data that support the variety of stakeholders who rely on DOL for critical information and services.

Digitizing Records for Easier Public Access

The General Land Office Records Automation System (GLORAS) modernization project at the BLM will make it faster, easier, and more cost-effective for the public to access historical BLM land documents. Specifically, it will introduce optical character recognition (OCR) and natural language processing (NLP), and the effort needed by BLM staff to publish land records will decrease by 80%. Users will benefit from improved efficiency and accuracy of the data retrieved and improved document images through a redesign of the public-facing web application.

Land records are in high demand, with the General Land Office (GLO) website reporting 80,000 unique visitors accessing the data every month. Many records are distributed across multiple websites or have yet to be digitized. The current GLORAS technology is outdated and inefficient, resulting in extensive delays for publishing the enormous number of records in the backlog. When users are unable to access records electronically, they must call or visit a BLM public room during business hours to obtain copies of records. This results in a frustrating experience for the American public and delays industry and government officials who require the records to make decisions related to public lands.

With TMF funding and support, BLM is taking an agile approach to increase the number of land records available online and enhance the search functionality on the GLO website. The first phase of the project focuses on applying machine learning to optimize records indexing. In phase two, GLO will integrate with other BLM applications to create a land records ecosystem. In phase three, GLO will become fully operational on the BLM’s Mission Services Platform, a software platform consisting of ESRI, Salesforce, DocuSign, Tableau, Mulesoft, Microsoft Powerapps, and other enterprise software platforms. Upon completion of phase three, BLM and the public will benefit from streamlined processes, improved quality assurance, and improved cyber controls.

Improving CX with Digital Content Delivery

The Enterprise Digital Content Delivery project at the NTSB will provide intuitive and timely access to NTSB data that is complete, accurate, and relevant. Since its inception in 1967, the NTSB has investigated more than 153,000 aviation accidents and thousands of surface transportation accidents, and has issued more than 15,300 safety recommendations as a result of its investigations. NTSB is charged with conducting objective, precise accident investigations and safety studies, and sharing those results. Information for all NTSB investigations and safety recommendations is publicly available on NTSB.gov.

NTSB is required under statute to make information learned from its investigations available to the public. However, the agency’s current systems and processes limit the ability of the interested parties, including recommendation recipients, federal and state regulators, advocates, families of accident victims, and Congress, to easily find, understand, and use information related to investigations and safety recommendations. Currently, information is stored in multiple systems, making it challenging for people to find what they are looking for. NTSB plans to build a unified digital experience that is backed by comprehensive data sets and includes all related content (text, visuals, and documents).

With TMF funding and support, the NTSB will improve the agency’s digital services by delivering the following core components:

• Digital Asset Management System: Managing NTSB digital assets to make better use of their datasets.
• Document Management & Report Publishing: Reimagining NTSB’s publishing workflows.
• Enterprise Content Delivery: Near real-time sharing of NTSB datasets, including investigation progress.
• Customer Notifications: Providing intuitive search and notification capabilities.

The funding will enable the NTSB to streamline and make their current systems more efficient so that stakeholders can find NTSB investigation information they are seeking, which is critical to improving public safety.

Securing Public Health Information with Mature Zero Trust

The HHS-OIG will modernize its cybersecurity infrastructure to enhance protections from sophisticated cyberattacks and protect the HHS program information and data it uses to meet the oversight mission. HHS-OIG will implement zero-trust solutions for networking, identity management, and security operations.

HHS-OIG’s oversight affects millions of Americans by improving the efficiency and integrity of government health programs. A robust cybersecurity infrastructure is crucial to supporting health programs. HHS-OIG regularly handles and analyzes large amounts of public health information and personally identifiable information. The HHS-OIG data analysts work with a data repository of grant, Medicare, and Medicaid claims data. These millions of data points are extensively analyzed to support multiple work streams, such as recommendations for improvements to COVID Provider Relief Fund operations, treatments for opioid overdose among Medicare beneficiaries, and investigations of multi-million-dollar healthcare fraud schemes. Ensuring the data and related analysis remain protected behind a robust and modern cybersecurity infrastructure is critical so Americans and government officials can maintain trust in the results of OIG’s oversight work.

Leveraging the Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) for funding and support, HHS-OIG will implement more secure, zero-trust mechanisms across its network, identity management, and security operations and risk management. To architect a zero-trust network, HHS-OIG will update its infrastructure to a secure, cloud-based model aligned with the Secure Access Service Edge requirements from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and national executive orders. Implementing an enterprise identity management solution will enable OIG’s applications to determine the level of access a user should be given to an application and its data. As a result, HHS-OIG will be better positioned to protect the sensitive HHS-OIG data and analytics critical to performing oversight.

Improving Mission Support with Modernized Applications

The FAA aims to modernize and remediate over one hundred legacy applications used to deliver administrative and mission-support services. This application rationalization project will reduce technical debt, improve security, and migrate critical business applications to an advanced cloud-based platform. Modernized applications will be zero trust ready and will run on a modern set of programming tools with automated build, test, and deployment capabilities.

In their current state, many FAA mission-supported legacy applications rely on outdated technologies and frameworks that pose a significant security risk. These challenges result in high costs to sustain the legacy applications. Due to these high sustainment costs, each year the FAA is forced to focus on technical debt remediation instead of business feature enhancements.

The FAA will modernize an initial 22 critical services with TMF funding and support, and leverage the operational cost savings to modernize the remaining legacy services. Part of this project will include creating an operational playbook the agency can confidently follow in repeating this work after modernizing the initial 22 services. The end result will be more efficient and secure applications, reduced maintenance costs, improved agility, and an increased ability to focus on business-critical enhancements.

Personal Data Security for Public Benefits Processing

The SSA will accelerate multi-factor authentication (MFA) to further improve its security posture and reduce risks from compromised credentials. This investment will bolster the secure operation of an agency that pays benefits to more than 70 million people, including retirement and disability beneficiaries and their families.

SSA’s front-line employees depend on the agency’s internal services to provide virtual, telephone, and in-office support to hundreds of thousands of customers daily. Maintaining the availability of these services is essential for the agency to meet its mission and deliver benefits and services to the American public.

With TMF funding and support, SSA will accelerate phishing-resistant MFA for all internal agency systems and services that currently do not use it. The project will onboard non-compliant systems to the agency’s MFA solution that uses single sign-on with HSPD-12 approved personal identity verification credentials. SSA will address several applications that use legacy authentication protocols, eliminating long-standing technical debt associated with maintaining these services. SSA will also establish continuous monitoring and governance to ensure both internal and external programmatic services remain compliant with federal security requirements and mandates.

Improving IT Security with Zero Trust Architecture

The USAGM is a small, independent executive branch agency with 2,500 full-time staff and contractors, the majority in Washington, D.C., and with reporters stationed in high-risk areas around the world. About 4,300 global media affiliates receive content from USAGM. An increasing number of these affiliates access the agency’s network to get this content. USAGM provides accurate, objective, and comprehensive news and information to audiences overseas who are often subject to censorship, strict media controls, or influence by violent extremism. Implementing zero trust architecture (ZTA) will support the agency’s mission and ultimately protect the lives of its journalists and their sources, safeguard the integrity of USAGM-funded news content frequently targeted by oppressive governments and non-state actors, and improve management of USAGM devices for its decentralized and remote workforce. USAGM will join the ZTA Federal Agency Working Group and utilize their shared experiences and lessons learned to optimize its ZTA implementation.

USAGM’s aging infrastructure meets the needs of journalists working in volatile media environments. However, the legacy solutions lack the ability to adequately correlate devices to individuals, implement multi-factor authentication protected identities across all the agency applications, and defend the agency’s cloud applications with the same security posture as its internal network. This project will help the agency:

• Deploy tools that will better control access to its network.
• Tailor application access based on individual needs.
• Reduce the number of identities that have access to all agency applications.
• Better support its changing workforce needs by transitioning to a network design suitable for a remote – and secure – workforce.

With TMF funding and support, USAGM will implement a zero trust architecture approach to cybersecurity that will secure the organization by eliminating implicit trust and continuously validating every stage of a digital interaction. USAGM will introduce a centrally managed “Master User Record” identity governance workflow that will solve many of its account management challenges regarding management of internal staff and vendor/contract account access to agency IT systems. The project will also implement a Secure Access Service Edge framework to protect all the agency’s remote workforce and all of the agency cloud applications.

Secure Cloud National Intelligence Sharing

The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Treasury Foreign Intelligence Network (TFIN) is used to share classified information with other government agencies. Treasury’s bureaus and subagencies rely on the network to identify and analyze overseas threats to America’s economy and finances and monitor and evaluate the evolving impact of foreign sanctions. TFIN’s cloud modernization project will allow Treasury to improve the reliability of this critical network. It will prevent interruptions and outages while meeting the needs of its approximately 800 national security users.

TFIN was established in 2006 and has suffered service disruptions from events like power interruptions to the main Treasury complex and routine or emergency security mitigations that can tie up its limited staff. Often these occur when the system is under the most use and/or threat. The network faces multiple challenges to its operations:

• It is vulnerable to major power disruptions from the local power grid.
• It requires major near-term security investments to comply with National Security Memorandum 8.
• Maintaining the current hardware-intensive system is not cost-effective.
• Hosting TFIN locally is not aligned with best practices for application performance and security.

With TMF funding and support, Treasury will transition to a hybrid cloud solution to deliver a robust, modern information technology infrastructure and a secure, decentralized network. There are three components to this new system. First, the project will establish a contract with an enterprise cloud service accredited for classified workloads. Second, critical applications will be migrated to an existing cloud provider for enhanced stability, processing, analytics, storage, and network cloud services. Finally, Treasury will adopt a software as a service virtual desktop solution. The contract will also make Treasury the first in the Intelligence Community to implement a cloud email productivity software solution. Lessons learned from this project will help inform other agencies in subsequent adoptions.

Citizen-Centric Online Self-Services

The RRB Citizen-Centric Online Self-Services project will move major services for railroad retirees from phone and paper to the internet, reducing staff and customer time spent accessing finances and government-administered benefits.

Over 675,000 annuitants, beneficiaries, and active employees seeking to change personal information such as address or direct deposit information, or complete an application for sickness benefits, currently have three ways to make these requests:

• Call an RRB field office to speak with a customer representative
• Make an in-person visit to one of 53 field offices, or
• Use the mail system to submit forms, applications, and supporting information.

These methods often result in long call wait times, inconvenient office visits, and mail delays. Additionally, there is currently no way to check the status of an individual’s request online.

With TMF funding and support, the RRB will implement new online self-services for the railroad community. In the first stage, the project will engage with railroad customers to create an intuitive user interface enabling them to make online self-updates of personal information for selected actions. Subsequent phases will modernize the sickness benefits application process so it can be completed online. Ultimately, the project also will enable railroad customers to obtain sickness application status updates online.

This project will allow the agency to address critical customer experience challenges by redirecting over 12,400 hours annually of frontline customer representatives’ time toward handling more complex beneficiary requests more expeditiously, while customers begin self-updating personal information through new online self-services.

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Project Campfire

USAID’s Enterprise Customer Relationship Management (ECRM) program – known as Project Campfire – will transform how the Agency manages its global relationships with strategic external partners and mobilizes their capabilities and financial resources to advance U.S. global development and humanitarian assistance goals. This investment will provide the startup capital necessary to develop and launch a brand new IT platform to coordinate USAID’s work with U.S.-based businesses, foundations and philanthropic organizations, academic and research institutions, public interest organizations, and more. USAID was designated as a High Impact Service Provider (HISP) by the Biden-Harris Administration in part because of the breadth and scale of its partnerships with public entities, such as those listed above.

To manage these relationships, the Agency presently relies on a patchwork of unconnected systems, standards, and business processes across different initiatives and offices worldwide. This approach burdens both USAID’s staff and partners with frustrating information silos, duplicative work, and an inefficient collaboration experience.

With TMF support, USAID will accelerate enterprise-wide CRM system implementation, begin deployment a year ahead of initial estimates, and deliver a best-in-class system. TMF funding will bolster the Agency’s own significant financial commitment to the project, enabling USAID to deliver a more functionally mature product faster.

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Development of the Next Generation Procurement List Information Management System (PLIMS) 2.0

The AbilityOne Program is one of the largest sources of employment in the United States for individuals who are blind or have significant disabilities. The U.S. AbilityOne Commission, an independent Federal agency, oversees the Program. The TMF investment will enable modernization of the Commission’s Procurement List Information Management System (PLIMS), the core software system responsible for connecting the Commission with the Program’s nonprofit agency employers of people who are blind or have significant disabilities and their Federal agency customers.

This project will connect Federal customers with program partners, improve system accessibility central to the agency mission, and create a more secure technical system with access control and disaster recovery capability. These improvements will increase the Commission’s ability to execute its statutory oversight of the Program, and will benefit the Federal customers who depend on AbilityOne products and services.

The current PLIMS is obsolete and has no original manufacturer support, significant security risks, duplicated data, and poor usability and accessibility. With nearly $4 billion in products and services that AbilityOne provides to the Federal government annually, these are problems that must be addressed. With TMF funding and support, the Commission will leverage open source technology delivered through an Agile program management process to modernize PLIMS in a cloud-based Software as a Service environment.

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Identity Credential Access Management (ICAM) Modernization for FHA Connection

With funding and support from the Technology Modernization Fund, the HUD will improve the user experience for more than 95,000 external Federal Housing Administration (FHA) users and align its IT security posture with Federal standards while also reducing costs.

FHA’s legacy systems are over-extended, cannot support cloud-based architecture, and do not align with the new Federal Identity Credential Access Management (FICAM) requirements. The systems are costly to maintain and consist of disparate identity management solutions with poor scalability. This impairs the user experience and prevents HUD from integrating its systems with outside agencies.

The Identity Credential Access Management (ICAM) Modernization for the FHA Connection (FHAC) will seamlessly integrate with Login.gov and improve customer experience by creating self-service registration capabilities for users, organizations, and application administrators. This mission-critical program supports 15 high-value systems including the Single Family and Multi-Family Housing Programs, Public and Indian Housing, and the Chief Financial Officer.

Modernization will improve detection of internal and external threats to FHAC systems and allow HUD to begin retiring legacy solutions like the Web Access Security System (WASS), FHAC, and SiteMinder. These changes are estimated to generate over $7 million in total savings.

The FHAC ICAM Modernization project will demonstrate how a Federal agency can leverage existing solutions (such as Login.gov, Okta, and Sailpoint) to migrate legacy authentication and authorization tools to a zero-trust-compatible solution. Once completed, this project will serve as a reference architecture for other agencies to modernize their processes to align with zero-trust goals.

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Website and Digital Modernization

With TMF funding and support, the OPM will update both the technology behind and the content on the OPM.gov website in order to improve and optimize the user experience for the site’s 22 million unique annual visitors. Currently, customers experience difficulty navigating the site, using the tools effectively, and finding the information they need. The almost 20,000 pages on OPM.gov contain 3,600 dead links, creating a confusing user experience for current Federal employees, job seekers, and HR professionals who visit OPM.gov expecting up-to-date and easily accessible information.

OPM will implement a modern and more secure Content Management System (CMS) hosted in OPM’s enterprise cloud environment so that users can have intuitive and accessible web tools. The project will also develop processes for publishing updated information and create an intranet environment that houses historical information. OPM will use a Digital Governance Board to ensure that technology, design, and process changes are customer-centric.

This investment will improve the Federal Government’s ability to recruit job seekers, supply the Federal workforce with relevant career-related information, and make it easier for public servants to manage their benefits. Creating more efficient services in turn creates a stronger, more effective Federal workforce to deliver services to the American people.

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Critical Infrastructure Cyber Protection

With the support of the TMF, the Army Critical Infrastructure Cyber Protection project will modernize and maintain operational technology of manufacturing arsenals, maintenance depots and ammunition plants, referred to as Organic Industrial Bases (OIB), which support the Army’s mission by manufacturing equipment, vehicles, and ammunition.

The Department of the Army operates 26 OIBs supported by nearly 28,000 employees responsible for operating sites that contribute an economic impact of more than $8.5 billion across the United States. An estimated 500,000 devices in the OIB constitute a significant attack surface area. Any network compromise would disrupt production and could potentially destroy equipment, injure workers, and impact coordination with multiple partner agencies. Any insecurities in the systems that support these OIBs could pose grave national security risks. The Army Critical Infrastructure Cyber Protection Project will enable Attack Sensing and Warning (AS&W) and Vulnerability Assessment (VA) cyber capabilities and establish a Security Operations as-a-Service framework that ensures cyber defenders can monitor, respond to, and remediate cyber threats.

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PERM Visa Modernization

The PERM Visa Modernization project at the DOL will make it easier, faster, and cheaper for employers to access permanent labor certification services and create a more seamless immigrant visa processing experience with the Departments of Homeland Security (DHS) and State (DOS). Specifically, it will integrate a modernized PERM labor certification process into DOL’s Foreign Labor Application Gateway (FLAG) digital platform, which uses GSA’s Login.gov services and enables the secure and efficient sharing of labor certification data across the multi-agency visa processing life cycle through its Interagency DataHub technology.

DOL processes nearly 120,000 requests for permanent labor certification across 73,000 unique employers annually. More than 68% of PERM applications request labor certification in STEM related jobs, and significant delays in processing may adversely affect the foreign worker’s ability to remain in the U.S and the employer’s ability to retain skilled talent. Employers seeking access to DOL permanent labor certification services currently face an outdated and fragmented sign-in and business verification process that is inefficient and challenging to navigate, redundant data collection and application filing requirements, multiple manual workarounds for agency staff, and lengthy labor certification documents that must be printed, signed, and mailed to DHS. The current system causes a poor customer experience for digitally accessing permanent labor certification services, inconsistent case processing times, unnecessary administrative costs for employers and government agencies, and increased fraud and security risks.

With TMF funding and support, DOL will transform three processes: the process for PERM filers to submit applications, the process for PERM analysts to review applications, and the process to submit PERM labor certification decisions to USCIS and DOS. DOL has re-engineered its business processes to eliminate manual and paper-based processes. PERM modernization will enable PERM analysts to create and issue correspondence to filers, to automate the audit selection process for integrity reviews and to access data on problematic employers. DOL anticipates a reduction in the adjudication cycle time by approximately 45 days, a cost savings of $1.5 million annually for PERM filers, and cost avoidance of $2.2 million annually related to the elimination of paper-based processes, the reduction of office space/physical document storage, and the redirection of staff from manual work to higher-value adjudication work.

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Grants Management Modernization

This investment will deliver simple, secure, effective, and responsive digital solutions for more than 2,800 local, nonprofit, faith, and community-based organizations applying for funding or managing their existing federal national service grants. It will also improve customer experience for approximately 250,000 individuals from more than 40,000 communities that AmeriCorps engages in results-driven service.

The current system, developed in 2002, cannot effectively integrate with other federal systems or user engagement tools, lacks modern business intelligence capabilities to manage grants, and significantly restricts AmeriCorps’ ability to meet its mission, keep pace with the current grant-making standards and technical needs, and appropriately steward agency resources.

With TMF funding and support, AmeriCorps will modernize its information technology infrastructure, reduce barriers to accessing AmeriCorps resources, expand the agency’s ability to recruit and retain new organizations, and support more than 1,300 existing grantees. With a modern, agile system, AmeriCorps will be able to react quickly and efficiently as community and national challenges arise.

AmeriCorps has formalized a partnership with the Grants Quality Service Management Office (QSMO) at the Department of Health and Human Services to capture new and emerging practices that can enhance federal grants management while providing value to other agencies. By replacing a legacy system that no longer meets user needs, AmeriCorps will be able to integrate these new and emerging federal grants practices, while significantly improving the agency’s ability to secure protected data. This system will underpin AmeriCorps’ complementary modernization initiatives designed to ensure that every American over 18 has an equitable opportunity to participate in national service and that US community-based organizations can benefit from national service resources.

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USAID Zero Trust Architecture

As a global enterprise, every technology asset, whether an application, laptop, desktop, server, or other device, represents both an opportunity and a risk for USAID. The “anywhere, anytime” access required by a global organization, coupled with the challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic, pushed the USAID network beyond the traditional perimeter boundary controls and left gaps in security such as remote identity proofing, privileged access management, and strong authentication assurance levels.

With the support of the TMF, USAID can accelerate funding for its Zero Trust initiatives and can advance the development timeline earlier, from FY 2025 to FY 2024. By the end of the project, USAID will have a modern identity management system that addresses the business problem by providing sufficient artifacts to meet Federal audit levels and compliance, as well as enhanced identity controls that permit USAID’s cybersecurity teams to dynamically govern USAID user access to systems/applications/networks uniformly, regardless of user location. This will provide a greater degree of protection for the agency’s cyber assets and improve the work experience of 13,000+ end users around the world by consolidating identities, modernizing authentication, providing password-less technology, and expanding the Agency’s secure work for “anytime, anywhere” access.

USAID’s planned capabilities are centered around five Zero Trust Architecture pillars - Identity, Devices, Networks, Applications & Workloads, and Data. TMF’s investment will support the Identity pillar projects under which USAID plans to complete next-generation Multifactor Authentication and Automation/Dynamic Access Control pilots in FY 2022 and complete the design and implementation in FY 2023. This will enable USAID to start transitioning users to the new identity management system in FY 2023. By FY 2024, USAID anticipates over 50% of users will be transitioned to the new Identity Management system.

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Network Modernization

This investment by the TMF in the U.S. Department of Agriculture Network Modernization (USDANet) will deliver an updated, 21st-Century network that enables the USDA to better serve its customers over the next decade and beyond. The current network faces challenges in keeping up with expanded program needs for throughput and security. With the support of the TMF, the USDA network will greatly improve reliability so that all USDA Mission Areas can meet their program needs. This investment will be used for the USDANet startup costs that reduces the number of USDA-owned and operated networks from 17 to 1 and will result in $734 million in estimated costs savings/avoidance.

Mission Areas like the Food Safety and Inspection Service, which delivers critical food safety data to industry, academia and the public through the Public Health Information System (PHIS), will benefit from faster, more consistent implementation of new security policies. USDANet will offer improved network security and a faster path to Trusted Internet Connection (TIC) 3.0 standards and Zero-Trust Architectures. This is critical in preventing cyber-attacks to operations in programs such as the Food, Nutrition, and Consumer Services which are responsible for the management, security, and distribution of $122 billion in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) for American families experiencing food insecurity.

The lowered total cost of ownership by the USDA means Mission Areas can allocate greater portions of their IT spending from basic infrastructure to public-facing applications that promote conservation, goodwill, and optimization of resources. It also enables USDA’s mission to provide economic opportunity through innovation, promotion of agricultural production that nourishes Americans while also feeding others throughout the world, and preserving our natural resources through conservation, restored forests, improved watersheds, smart agriculture, and healthy private working lands.

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Multi-Cloud Security Operations Center

This project will keep sensitive law enforcement, corporate competition filing, and American consumer data more secure and resilient to attack. FTC collects data from thousands of corporate merger filings and millions of consumer fraud complaints every year. Along with U.S. and International law enforcement partners, the FTC uses this data to promote competition and protect consumers. The data is under increasingly sophisticated attacks from multiple adversaries.

To accomplish the project’s goal the FTC will procure a security operations center (SOC) as a service that modernizes existing government SOCs and allows for faster decision-making, a reduced vulnerability attack surface, and an improved repeatable foundation for future government-wide implementations of SOC as a Service (SOCaaS). The agency’s current SOC approach, like many others in government, is built for government operated data centers that don’t efficiently scale to address increasing numbers of alerts.

With the support of this TMF investment, the FTC will expedite its SOCaaS implementation using security services and trusted cloud service providers to host sensitive FTC data. This comprehensive approach will greatly reduce the risk of bad actors executing a ransomware or other cyber attack. It will also reduce the number of man hours currently expended to respond to indicators of cyber incidents. These hours could then be repurposed to continue improvements to the agency’s many operational systems for merger filing review and reporting of fraud. The agency is collaborating on this effort with other federal cyber security leaders, including the Department of Homeland Security, to share best practices.

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Information Sharing Modernization

This project will help modernize DHS’ Homeland Security Information Network (HSIN) service to develop an updated and more secure platform for information sharing among first responders, law enforcement, and government partners in the event of natural disasters, security events, and other crises.

Information sharing has been a core mission of DHS since its founding. Fulfilling that mission involves delivering timely intelligence and enabling real-time collaboration across a large and diverse number of organizations including federal, state, local, territorial, tribal, international, and private sector decision-makers, and first responders. HSIN played a pivotal role during the COVID-19 pandemic supporting coordination with hundreds of organizations for vaccine distribution, providing information, and coordinating operations. The network was used by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the Center for Disease Control (CDC), the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and Fusion Centers, as well as additional state and local partners, putting unprecedented pressure on DHS’s decade-old information sharing network and exposing limitations in its ability to manage growth in excess of 200% during the height of the pandemic.

With TMF funding and support, DHS plans to rebuild its information sharing system as a cloud native platform with modern tools and technologies. The new platform will be capable of scaling up to meet peaks in demand during times of emergency while also offering significant new features including improved access and security; better content sharing and discoverability; and greater emphasis on connecting HSIN’s partners to each other for closer collaboration. DHS will also use the TMF investment to build a platform that is more responsive to a post pandemic work environment for users with easy and secure access on mobile platforms and other devices.

This investment will accelerate DHS’ modernization of a system that is core to its mission. A system that is more flexible, offers a better user experience, and is less costly to maintain. The operational benefits of this project include building a stronger community of federal, state, local, tribal, territorial, international, and private sector partners for closer coordination, more effective emergency response, and improved national security.

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High Value Asset Mission Essential Systems

This project will digitize and transform NARA’s paper-based fulfillment processes for citizen records requests, allowing for rapid retrieval and delivery of electronic copies of records to the public and other government agencies through secure, accessible web portals.

NARA serves as the nation’s record keeper, holding federal records dating back to the American Revolution. These include veterans’ military service and medical records as well as billions of other citizen records. Each year, NARA receives approximately 1.1 million records requests from veterans and their families who need to access benefits, as well as nearly 8 million records requests from over 400 Federal agencies that need to provide citizen services and fulfill their missions.

Nearly all of these requested records are only available on paper, stored in records facilities located across the country. COVID-19 put significant pressure on these operations, limiting onsite processing capacity, creating a backlog of hundreds of thousands of records requests, and highlighting the need for a more responsive and modern record delivery process.

With TMF investment and support, NARA will replace its legacy case management, reporting, and records information systems with cloud-based platforms. Among other benefits, this investment will allow veterans and their families to electronically request and receive their records, while supporting agency customers with greater responsiveness as they transition toward digital recordkeeping. It will also allow NARA staff to fulfill records requests remotely, fully digitally, and in a secure fashion.

This project’s benefits include major improvements in customer experience, decreased processing time for records requests, and improved resilience in the face of future disruptions. By ensuring that NARA can provide Federal records more quickly and reliably, this TMF investment will help citizens to better exercise their rights and more quickly access government benefits to which they are due.

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Network Monitoring, Detection, and Response

This project will improve USDA’s threat monitoring, detection and response capabilities. This investment will help USDA move toward implementing a Zero Trust Architecture, better secure its shared services and sensitive data, and protect Department websites that connect citizens to vital services.

USDA’s nearly 100,000 employees are spread across more than 4,500 locations across the country and abroad. Its 29 agencies and bureaus do critical work in areas ranging from rural development and forest management to nutrition programs, agricultural research, and international trade. It also houses the National Finance Center (NFC), which provides payroll services for over 600,000 employees and financial services for more than 40 agencies across the federal government. These vital functions all generate large volumes of sensitive information that require safeguarding. The SolarWinds attack underscored the need for enhanced response capabilities at USDA and across the government.

With the TMF funding and support, USDA will implement a set of new software tools to improve USDA’s cybersecurity posture. These include applications that will enhance automated threat hunting and detection, improve visibility of encrypted network traffic, and reduce risks. Once implemented, this project will dramatically improve USDA’s ability to prevent, detect, and remediate any network intrusions at USDA and contribute to the security of the Federal enterprise. It will also allow USDA to deploy tools to protect its public-facing websites, ensuring that the public can reliably access information about farm loans, nutrition assistance, food safety inspections, and other key USDA offerings. These improvements will allow the agency to meet its obligations laid out in the Executive Order on Improving the Nation’s Cybersecurity.

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Veteran Identity Modernization

This project will make it faster, cheaper, and easier for veterans to access VA services and benefits. Specifically, it will modernize the sign-in experience at VA, allowing eligible veterans to digitally access benefits and services more reliably and securely with Login.gov.

VA digital services are used by millions of veterans every month. Veterans seeking to access VA services currently face a fragmented sign-in process that is confusing and hard to use – there are currently multiple sign-in pathways and four credential options with differing levels of compliance, security, and usability. This results in a poor user experience for digitally accessing benefits and services, high costs of licensing duplicative credentials, and increased fraud and security risks.

With TMF funding and support, VA will take three steps towards the implementation of a single, modern, and easy to use sign-in service at VA. First, this project will support the seamless transition of existing users to Login.gov. Second, VA will create an in-person identity verification option for veterans unable to sign up online. Finally, VA will pilot physical security keys for multi-factor authentication to improve accessibility and make digital services more secure. This investment will not only improve the experience of veterans accessing VA benefits and services, but also reduce VA costs and the risk of fraud.

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IT Modernization

This project will modernize PRC’s website, docket, and data analysis tools, allowing the public to more easily access and participate in the Commission’s proceedings and equipping the PRC staff with the resources to more efficiently and effectively execute on its goal of providing transparent and effective oversight of the US Postal Service’s (USPS) operations.

The PRC is a small agency with a big mission: independent oversight of the USPS, a global operation that delivered over 128 billion pieces of mail, including over 7 billion packages in FY 2021, and operates more than 34 thousand post offices. The pandemic, workforce shortages, and supply chain disruptions have posed urgent new challenges for the postal system and its ability to provide efficient and effective mail delivery for the American people. These developments and a surge in interest in postal matters have challenged the PRC’s capacity to carry out its mission of ensuring transparency and accountability of the Postal Service and fostering a vital and efficient universal mail system. These new demands have put significant pressure on PRC’s public facing website and docket system. This system is over 20 years old and is at imminent risk of failure. An antiquated data environment and analysis tools also force PRC economists to conduct analyses of massive volumes of data manually, hindering PRC’s ability to quickly and appropriately scale up oversight efforts to address the multiplying challenges.

With TMF funding and support, the PRC team plans to replace its systems with cloud-based applications. The team will develop three key platforms: a new public-facing website, a modern docket system, and a data management system. This investment will empower PRC with the tools it needs to ensure that the USPS remains effective and responsive to the public in the face of unprecedented challenges. The operational benefits of this project include faster and more thorough analysis of data, a more navigable and user-friendly website, and reduced operation and maintenance costs.

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Registration and Verification Modernization

This project aims to modernize SSS’ Registration, Compliance, and Verification (RCV) software to improve the resiliency of the application and enable the Agency to rapidly scale their technical operations to meet the nation’s needs.

The SSS is a small agency charged with registering all male U.S. citizens and male immigrants residing in the United States between the ages of 18 and 25. The agency’s registry is critical in the event of any national emergency requiring a mobilization for national defense. Annually, the SSS’s team of 115 manages over two million selective service registrations and approximately six million enrollment verification checks. This registration data also provides eligibility verification for student aid, over four million Federal civilian and local government jobs, free job training, and a potential streamlined process for citizenship.

The Agency will use this investment to migrate RCV to a cloud-first software and data architecture, enhance its cybersecurity protection and performance capabilities, and improve the application’s public-facing user experience. RCV, a High Value Asset (HVA), will be redesigned to a new modern architecture featuring continuous availability from redundant geographic locations, enhanced protection of Personally Identifiable Information (PII), and advanced data analytics, helping the Agency leverage registrant data to make timely and informed decisions that will ensure the fairness and equity of any future mobilization. Through this work, the project will transform the agency’s technical operations to both maintain a steady state of readiness, and to scale up rapidly when activated by Congress and the President.

Operational benefits of this project include enhanced cybersecurity protections, reduced maintenance costs, improved system resiliency, and rapid operational scalability. The TMF is well-positioned to deliver rapid, timely funding for mission-critical modernization projects to small agencies like the SSS, and is excited for this project to further the federal government’s mission to strengthen cybersecurity and improve service delivery to the nation.

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Zero Trust Networking

This project will accelerate the agency’s adoption of a zero trust cybersecurity architecture strategy. As the Human Resources (HR) provider for the Federal Government, OPM manages extremely sensitive personal data for millions of current and retired Federal employees. Using TMF funds, this project will implement zero trust solutions across the 5 main zero trust pillars: 1) Identity, 2) Devices and Endpoint, 3) Network and Environment, 4) Application Workload, and 5) Data. This effort will reduce OPM’s attack surface and increase cybersecurity protections, visibility, and the resiliency of their services.

This project will enable OPM to fully comply with the mandates established in the Executive Order on “Improving the Nation’s Cybersecurity.” Furthermore, implementing zero trust will provide OPM with additional identity management options for enhanced collaboration with agency partners. The operational benefits of this project include reducing the number of security tools required to monitor and maintain an effective cybersecurity program, cost savings, and improved interagency communications and collaboration efforts. By the end of this project, OPM will achieve significant progress on their journey to achieve an Optimal level in the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Zero Trust Maturity Model.

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Zero Trust Architecture

This project will allow ED to create and fully implement a zero trust architecture plan across the enterprise to increase the security of the citizen data the department maintains.

Using TMF funds, ED will enact a zero trust program over a span of two years that includes strategy, architecture, design, and an implementation roadmap. ED will also establish a catalog of services with secure access service edge (SASE) and security orchestration, automation and response (SOAR) technologies. The department will stand up an enterprise-wide program management office dedicated to zero trust as well as adopt an advanced architecture across cloud-computing environments in accordance with the developed roadmap. By improving and modernizing cybersecurity technologies the Department will provide more secure and less burdensome user experiences both for employees and the public.

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Advancing Zero Trust

This project will allow the GSA to modernize legacy network systems and implement an advanced zero trust architecture (ZTA).

Using TMF Funds, GSA will advance their cybersecurity architecture by focusing on three blocks: Users and Devices, Networks, and Security Operations. Within the first block, GSA will replace directory designs to meet the newer demands of telework and a multi-domain, hybrid cloud architecture approach with virtualization adhering to enhanced security principles. GSA will also develop a modernized enterprise single-sign-on (SSO) to include new multi-factor authentication options. In the second block, GSA will focus on microsegmentation by leveraging a secure access service edge (SASE) solution and upgrading their public buildings’ security network. Lastly, GSA will adopt increased machine learning and artificial intelligence driven algorithms to help connect diverse data sources and highlight threats while providing security oversight for cyber supply chain risk management and enhancing core security operations centers to include governmentwide public-facing digital services.

By implementing these modernization efforts, GSA will improve user experience through seamless global connection to GSA-managed environments and applications while maintaining ZTA principles. It will improve cybersecurity capabilities to continually verify the security of users, devices, applications, and data as well as achieve broad-based visibility across the GSA ecosystem with enhanced capabilities leveraging automation to manage and respond to threats in real-time.

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Login.gov

This project will allow the GSA to further scale the Login.gov shared service with more advanced cybersecurity capabilities, expand identity verification coverage, and expand integrations with agency public-facing digital services.

Login.gov is a secure sign-in service used by over 30+ million citizens and businesses to access over 200 services spanning 27 federal agencies. A shared identity service like Login.gov is critical for reducing government costs, providing a seamless user experience to individuals, and ensuring the privacy and protection of user data. While the initial launch and adoption of Login.gov have been successful, additional support is required to expand and accommodate the requirements of all federal agencies, to reach a significantly broader segment of the public, and to achieve a sustainable cost-model without cost being a barrier to entry for individual agencies. Additionally, one of the primary goals of these funds is to provide accessible and equitable capabilities that can be used by underserved and vulnerable populations that traditionally have experienced barriers to online or digital services.

The TMF funding will serve three purposes. First, it will increase cybersecurity identification and protection for current and future users. Second, it will add equitable identity verification and in-person options for vulnerable populations. Third, it will grow the Login.gov environment by reducing the barrier to entry for agencies to allow for Login.gov to increase usage to a higher percentage of citizen participation. The operational benefits of this project include increasing identity verification services, reducing fraud, expanding access to digital services for millions of citizens, and reducing government-wide costs at scale.

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Southwest Border Technology Integration Program

This project allows DHS to use data and technology to more efficiently, effectively, and humanely process noncitizens encountered at our Southwest Border.

Southwest Border processing involves multiple DHS Components and partner agencies, each operating on independent data systems and many key handoffs still taking place with paper files. The Southwest Border Technology Integration Program (TIP) will provide standardized and secure data sharing across the Federal enterprise and throughout the immigration lifecycle to improve border flow and capacity management and increase the timeliness and fidelity of data used by decision makers. This project will connect disparate systems, improve cross-agency collaboration, and support data-driven decision-making.

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MAX.gov Transition

This investment began in September 2021 and presented their final update to the TMF Board in April 2023.

With this project, the GSA sought to enhance MAX.gov to provide a modernized, secure cloud-based solution for cross-agency collaboration, authentication, and other shared services capabilities.

MAX.gov usage has significantly increased in the 14 years since its deployment, and dozens of agencies rely on the system for mission critical operations. MAX.gov was at a critical juncture where the technology was outdated and increased demand was affecting scalability. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) transitioned the program to GSA’s Technology Transformation Services (TTS) to continue to support 73 partner agencies while enhancing and expanding collaboration technologies to the rest of the government. The MAX.gov Transition Project Management Office (PMO) within TTS was charged with creating modern cloud-based authentication and collaboration products for government organizations on a fee-for-service basis.

From November 2022 to February 2023, GSA re-examined its approach and came to an agreement with OMB to stop the MAX.gov transition efforts due to its unviability as a cost-recoverable service, low desirability in the agency customer marketplace, and infeasibility to build and maintain a custom environment for agency partners. OMB has been working with agency partners to maintain the current system while other transition efforts are explored.

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UNISYS Mainframe Migration

This investment began in August 2018 and presented their final update to the TMF Board in August 2022.

This project modernized the codebase and accelerated the migration of five of HUD’s most critical business systems from an on-premise mainframe database to the cloud. Both the existing mainframe and the five COBOL-based applications were expensive to maintain and required functional system enhancements to be built in an antiquated mainframe environment, deepening the technical debt associated with the eventual decommissioning of the platform.

The new modern platform is a Java and cloud-based application suite that costs less to maintain and update, enabling functional and technical enhancements to be completed more rapidly. These systems support 30,000 users for more than 100 HUD grant, subsidy, and loan programs that disburse $27 billion per year. According to HUD estimates, the code modernization and migration will save $8 million annually, allowing funds to transform additional legacy systems.

Securing a TMF investment served as a catalyst inside the Department and led to garnering strong support for this project at all levels of the organization. As a result, HUD leadership allocated additional internal funds to accelerate the project, reduce the amount needed from the TMF to $13,850,013, and still achieve the full benefits of the original proposal.

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Enterprise Cloud Email

This investment began in July 2018 and presented their final update to the TMF Board in July 2022.

Maintaining multiple on-premises email environments not only drives up agency costs, but also increases the enterprise’s threat vector. Before starting this project, DOE operated 64 separate email systems (of which 45 were on-premises) that serviced approximately 184,387 mailboxes across the Department. Since FY 2018, DOE has completed moving 14 on-premises systems to cloud email, decommissioned one system, and established internally funded migration plans for 12 additional systems. DOE has been able to enhance its cybersecurity posture, reduce IT management and maintenance costs, and provide employees with a more robust email platform while migrating its email infrastructure to the cloud. While the focus was on email migration, this project provides DOE residual benefits. By leveraging Office 365 G5 licensing it not only supported DOE’s email requirements but the inherit capabilities within the Microsoft offering includes multiple collaboration capabilities (i.e., Teams, One Drive for Business) These capabilities will allow DOE to remove existing lines of demarcation and facilitate efficient, streamlined communications throughout the enterprise.

The Department originally requested $15,217,096 to complete the consolidation, upgrade, and migration effort for 26 on-premises systems (out of 45). The Department’s decision to pursue TMF funding served as a catalyst to garner support from federated labs and field offices, and enabled several DOE components to secure internal funding and move forward with migration efforts independently. DOE also identified 2,201 mailboxes that can be decommissioned, rather than migrated, due to the elimination of secondary email systems and other efficiencies. Due to the success of these efforts and additional internal investment, DOE completed the project with a reduced TMF funding amount of $2.4 million dollars. The project kicked off in Q4 2018 and over the project lifecycle, they have successfully migrated all 15,951 mailboxes, at sites within scope, to the cloud.

Without this funding, DOE would have had to conduct the migration using a piecemeal approach requiring an elongated migration timeline. With support from the TMF, the project was tackled as a single effort which accelerated the overall migration effort. The operational benefits of this project include cost avoidance, increased efficiency, improved cyber posture, and decreased operational risk.

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Farmers.gov Customer Experience Portal

This investment began in July 2018 and presented their final update to the TMF Board in May 2021.

In 2017, USDA established the Farm Production and Conservation (FPAC) mission area that encompasses the work of the Farm Service Agency (FSA), the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), and the Risk Management Agency (RMA). Both FSA and NRCS provide financial and technical assistance to farmers and ranchers through related conservation programs. In an effort to consolidate interconnected systems and improve the end user experience, the Department planned to update and modernize conservation financial assistance and payment operations systems across FSA and NRCS.

In just under 2 years, USDA developed a proof of concept that integrated disparate enrollment processes into a consolidated Farmers.gov Citizen Experience Portal. With a $4,000,000 investment from the TMF, USDA documented both current and proposed processes, identified and developed four robotics process operations (RPA) demonstration tools, and developed a proof of concept to test a shared enrollment process across FSA and NRCS. Through this work, the Department identified future alignment needs between different policies and processes and demonstrated how robotic process automation capabilities could be used in different business areas to create process efficiencies.

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Labor Certificate Processing Modernization

This investment began in January 2019 and presented their final update to the TMF Board in May 2021.

Prior to this project, the DOL used an outdated paper-based process to issue Labor Certifications to employer applicants for certain types of work visas. This process required both specialized printing on costly security paper and employer applicants and representatives to manually mail Labor Certifications and other relevant documents to the Department of Homeland Security U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) as part of their visa application.

Without this investment, DOL would need to continuously maintain and require the use of paper-based form processing, adding time and friction to a critical workflow. With the support of the TMF and its investment of $3,500,000, the project team eliminated the need for both the DOL and the employer applicant to mail Labor Certification forms back and forth and to USCIS.

Over the course of two years, the team used an agile approach to improve systems, enabling the Department to securely issue Labor Certifications electronically through an “E-Certification” document, similar to the electronic boarding passes issued by airlines. In addition, this project streamlined and improved data accessibility and reporting capabilities by creating a data hub at the Department to securely transmit the Labor Certification and other necessary documentation to USCIS, giving agencies direct access to case files. In November 2020, the Department successfully transitioned the Labor Certification process for all types of visas from paper to digital “E-Certification”, producing an estimated annual cost avoidance of $2,000,000 in supplies and labor, increasing efficiency, and improving a painful end-user experience. This work eliminated an artificial barrier to the number of certifications that could be issued daily, allowing the Department to issue 176% more H-2A certifications and 109% more H-2B certifications in a single day. It also gave farmers and employers immediate access to their certifications, saving them costly trips away from the farm to sign and mail documents.

Read the case study associated with this investment.

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Application Modernization Integrating Flexible Architectures

This investment began in October 2018 and presented their final update to the TMF Board in June 2023.

In 2018, GSA had 88 IT applications in need of modernization. The applications had cumbersome, outdated user interfaces and were difficult to connect to other systems. Despite the need for transformation, GSA would have had to modernize legacy systems in a piecemeal fashion, as funding became available in annual budgets. With the support of the TMF and its investment of $7,808,563.00, the team could pursue a full and faster transformation of all planned applications, including at the hardware, database, and application layers.

Over the course of three years, GSA used a cross-functional Solutions Team with a deep understanding of the applications’ technical specifications and employed best-in-class agile methodologies. The team created a set of standard target technologies for all future application migrations. They generated various playbooks (Database Transformation and Sensitive Data Migration) that have already guided the modernization of 10 additional GSA applications and are accessible to all other government agencies. This TMF project ultimately enabled GSA to develop greater agility, resiliency, scalability, and performance. In addition, it also allowed GSA greater flexibility in recruiting talent. In the long term, these outcomes promise to lower the cost of operations, improve the quality of GSA applications, and establish a repeatable process for modernizing legacy applications that can be leveraged across the government enterprise.

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Infrastructure Optimization and Cloud Adoption

This investment began in November 2018 and presented their final update to the TMF Board in April 2020.

In 2018, USDA had mission critical applications that were riddled with system performance issues and security challenges, as well as a decentralized IT infrastructure that was costly to maintain and upgrade. Ten critical applications were hosted on costly mission area-specific data centers, resulting in poor enterprise adoption of cloud services and a lack of expertise to maintain them. With the support of the TMF and its investment of $500,000, USDA worked with the GSA Cloud Centers of Excellence to develop their approach and the project represented the beginning of a continuous cloud-enablement across USDA.

This project enabled the Department to consolidate their cloud expertise and leverage it enterprise-wide. It also served as a catalyst inside the Department to generate buy-in from USDA’s agencies and components for this approach. Due to the strong support for this project at all levels of the organization generated by the TMF investment, the Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) secured internal funding to move forward with a migration of five applications. With the support of the TMF, USDA completed the migration of the Emergency Watershed Protection application in the Farm Production and Conservation portfolio, improving functionality and generating cost savings used to repay the TMF. Leveraging TMF funds allowed USDA to migrate a critical application to the cloud, conduct additional application rationalization efforts using established best practices, and set an example of how cloud migration could be tackled successfully across the agency.

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NewPay Payroll and Work Schedule and Leave Management Software-as-a-Service

This investment began in February 2019 and presented their final update to the TMF Board in July 2021.

Federal payroll operations commonly rely on decades-old legacy software, which is costly and difficult to maintain. With support from the TMF, GSA created a minimum viable product (MVP) to address this need by leveraging software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions, with the aim of laying a new foundation for an enterprise solution for human resource functions government wide. During the development of the MVP, GSA received the designation of Quality Service Management Office (QSMO) for Civilian HR Transaction Services for payroll and work schedule and leave management (WSLM), providing operational support for compensation management, work schedule, and leave management services. The HR QSMO continues to partner and collaborate with stakeholder groups, both within OPM and across the federal human resources (HR) community, in the development of data standards to support the implementation of modern technical solutions within the Civilian HR Transactions marketplace.

GSA originally requested $20,650,000 for this NewPay project to develop a software-as-a-service solution (SaaS) and related interfaces for payroll and WSLM. GSA and other agencies requested Congressional appropriations in FY 2019 and FY 2020 to conduct planning and migration activities for the Payroll Shared Service Providers and agencies to migrate to the NewPay solution; however, the requested funding was not granted. As a result, and given the uncertain timing of agency migrations to the new tool, the agency revised and reduced the project scope and funding required. The project was completed after designing and configuring the NewPay payroll solution for 65 pay plans and completed verification testing for 12 of the most common plans, at a reduced cost of under $8M. With the support from the TMF, the project was able to stand up initial payroll capabilities for Title 5 employees and provide a tool that demonstrates how federal HR standards and regulations can be applied in the context of a commercial SaaS solution to improve key HR functions such as payroll operations in a federal environment.

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Charge and Case Management System Modernization

This project will accelerate the modernization of EEOC’s charge and case management system. Currently, EEOC’s charge and case management program is running on an outdated and slow backbone system that relies heavily on costly proprietary technologies and requires the use of precise alphanumeric codes, rather than plain language, to record case information for the more than 200,000 inquiries reviewed by the agency each year. This project will allow for faster, more efficient review of cases and will reduce the costs of operating the system.

EEOC anticipates it will have a greater ability to serve its mission by improving the basic functionality of its core charge and case management system, which will not only make EEOC’s private and public sector operations more efficient but also benefit the Fair Employment Practice Agencies that rely on EEOC’s system to manage their cases. In addition, applicants and employees seeking assistance from EEOC will be able to take advantage of end-to-end digital processing of their charges.

By the end of this project, EEOC will have a modern, cloud-based core charge and case management system that will modernize both the underlying technology and achieve operational efficiencies that will decrease its current software licensing expenses and reduce other existing development and maintenance expenditures. The operational benefits of this project include increased efficiency, cost savings and improved citizen services.

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Agricultural Marketing Service Specialty Crops System Modernization

This investment began in January 2020 and presented their final update to the TMF Board in March 2023.

This project accelerated the modernization of the USDA Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) Specialty Crops Inspection Division (SCID) billing, inspection, and certificate generation and issuance processes that support the inspection and certification of more than 10.7 billion pounds of processed fruit and vegetable products and 49.9 billion pounds of fresh fruits and vegetables. This includes 1.2 billion pounds of fresh and processed fruit and vegetable items valued at more than $713 million for domestic feeding programs (school lunches) and 7,183 lots, or 410 million servings, of military combat rations at 18 processing plants nationwide and in American Samoa to ensure the quality of the military’s food components.

Previously, USDA AMS’s billing, inspection, and certificate generation and issuance processes were managed through a combination of inefficient manual, paper-based processes and legacy information technology systems that were outdated and difficult to maintain. This project allowed the Specialty Crops Inspection program to modernize its systems and processes by moving the agency to a cloud-based solution that leverages existing commercial products and offerings. Moreover, this project facilitated a cultural transformation in the Specialty Crops Inspection program, streamlining, standardizing, and modernizing the underlying processes that support this important work.

Without this funding, USDA would have needed to complete this project gradually over a period of five years. However, with support from the TMF the project was conducted as a single effort and completed over a period of three years. USDA now has a modern, holistic system for its billing, inspection, and certificate generation and issuance processes that will enable AMS Specialty Crops inspectors, front-line managers, and other users to comprehensively and securely gather and store field evaluation data, interface with internal and external business applications, and process customer order and billing information. This project ensures that perishable agricultural items are more efficiently moved through the inspection process ensuring the end consumer enjoys the freshest commodities possible. The operational benefits of this project include increased efficiency and improved customer service.

Read the case study associated with this investment.

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Automated Commercial Environment Collections Module

This investment began in October 2020 and presented their final update to the TMF Board in September 2022.

CBP’s 30-year-old collection tool, the Automated Commercial System (ACS), was housed on the agency’s last remaining mainframe solution that ran and used 3.9 million lines of antiquated COBOL code. The current operational environment requires a modernized system to meet the demands of the CBP mission and provide the Agency with a flexible, secure platform to support the growing complexities of global trade facilitation and enforcement. An efficient and secure system will reinforce CBP’s mission to enhance legitimate trade and travel and will improve customs enforcement, revenue collections, trade protections, and access capabilities.

Through this project, CBP modernized the outdated ACS platform through the development of the Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) Collections module. The development of the ACE Collections module enabled CBP to retire ACS, as well as decommission CBP’s last remaining mainframe solution. This project will help CBP improve customs enforcement, revenue collections, trade protections, and user experience through improved features and business capabilities, while in the long run reducing the operations and maintenance costs associated with the existing system. CBP has already begun work on this project using internal funding, and deployed the first module of the new tool, the ACE Collections Release Statements Automated Clearing House (ACH) Processing in 2019.

Without this funding, CBP would have continued to rely on the outdated Collections system and pay the significant costs associated with the mainframe solution. However, with support from the TMF, the project was conducted in less than 3 years as a single effort to replace the legacy system. CBP now has a cloud-based core Collections system that will modernize both the underlying technology and the code base. CBP will also achieve operational efficiencies that will decrease its current software expenses and reduce other existing development and maintenance expenditures. CBP anticipates it will have a greater ability to serve its mission by modernizing the basic functionality of its Collections system. This modernization has made CBP’s operations more efficient, resilient, and secure, while safeguarding the Nation’s global economic competitiveness through legitimate trade to benefit the U.S. businesses and partnering government agencies.

Read the case study associated with this investment.

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Data Modernization

This project will modernize DOL’s enterprise data management and analytics capabilities to help improve availability and accessibility of critical DOL data to all consumers of that data – including developers, journalists, researchers, and other Federal agencies.

Currently, DOL faces data quality, consistency, and availability issues which limit the Department’s ability to use it to drive organizational performance improvements. The proposed DOL project will 1) incorporate enterprise-standard predictive analytics and reporting capabilities into the DOL IT Platform, 2) implement enterprise data management capabilities and 3) support an application programming interface (API) and public-facing data portal to transform how the DOL shares data, both internally and with the public. This project will also support DOL’s mission areas and deploy resources in a manner which maximizes organizational performance. Furthermore, this project will enable DOL to integrate duplicative data services leading to reduced operations and maintenance and human capital expenses associated with maintaining them.

Without this funding, DOL could not accelerate development of an enterprise approach to improving data quality and expanding the number of data sets available internally and to the public. However, with the support from the TMF, the project can be advanced as an enterprise initiative over two years, building an essential foundation. By the end of this project, DOL will unlock the department’s enterprise data sources, create data management capacity, and ensure timely delivery of appropriate information to the right DOL staff and customers in a secure manner. This transformation enables an evidence-based decision-making approach across enforcement, compliance, unemployment insurance and other DOL mission areas. The operational benefits of this project include cost savings, increased efficiency, and improved services for the public.

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Classified Projects

Details on classified projects are not included here. If you have questions about a classified project, please contact tmf@gsa.gov.

 

 

 

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* For agencies using an assisted acquisition strategy, reporting does not include funding obligated to the assisted acquisition provider but not yet awarded to a contract.