The U.S. Education Department launched the EdSim Challenge on Wednesday for simulation-based learning solutions. The cash prize pool includes $680,000 with additional winnings from IBM, Microsoft, Oculus, and Samsung. The challenge asks virtual reality specialists, video game developers, and education professionals to create ideas for educational simulations that would prepare students for future careers. […]

Over the past few years, many government agencies have turned from doubting and distrusting the cloud to fully embracing its potential, according to Microsoft executives. […]

The Department of Justice appealed the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision in favor of Microsoft that said American service providers are not required to honor warrants seeking data outside the United States. In this case, which was decided in July, the data the DOJ was asking for belonged to a non-U.S. citizen and was stored in a data center in Ireland. […]

Microsoft on Tuesday announced new advancements to its government cloud offerings, which will expand its ability to store Department of Defense data and increase the number of regions in which their data centers are available. […]

The U.S. law enforcement and intelligence communities will not be able to access information stored on Microsoft’s new German data centers, according to a former NSA official. […]

The General Services Administration announced that the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online Government was issued a Provisional Authority to Operate by the Joint Authorization Board on Sept. 22, the first product to receive one through the new FedRAMP Accelerated program. […]

Federal agencies can now move their Red Hat subscriptions between physical or on-premises systems to both Microsoft Azure and Azure Government cloud platforms. […]

Federal agencies can now use cloud computing systems to store their most sensitive, unclassified data, through the recent release of the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program High Baseline.
“This release allows agencies to use cloud environments for high-impact data, including data that involves the protection of life and financial ruin,” said the FedRAMP announcement. […]

In the era of the Internet of Things, Federal agencies need to change the way they think of cybersecurity, according to Microsoft Federal CTO Susie Adams. […]

The Department of Defense is ready to upgrade all Windows-based legacy systems to Windows 10 by January 2017. Nearly three months after Chief Information Officer Terry Halvorsen issued a new policy requiring the upgrade, a verbal execution order has gone out that puts the unprecedented migration effort into motion. […]