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Secret Service Computer Systems Hopelessly Outdated

by Terrence O'Brien on February 26, 2010 at 04:30 PM

Secret Service Computer Systems Hopelessly Outdated
The fact that the government and most of its agencies are still stuck in the technological dark ages is no longer news. Officials in the Obama administration have been shouting it from the hilltops since they rolled into D.C. on their social networking-powered bus. But, while Obama has been pushing the government into the 21st century (though those accomplishments are often overshadowed by failures), progress has been too slow in coming to some incredibly important agencies.

Case in point is the Secret Service. According to a recent review of its IT capabilities by the NSA, the Secret Service's computer systems are only fully operational 60-percent of the time. This is in large part thanks to the '80s-era mainframes that still host the agency's databases. Senator Droopy Joe Lieberman told ABC News that "they have to have better IT than they have" in order to properly protect the president and vice president.

The Department of Homeland Security has allocated $69 million in the most recent budget to update the Secret Service systems. Sadly, though, that's only about a third of the $187 million needed to upgrade the entire system to current governmental standards. [From: ABC News]

Tags: Department of Homeland Security, DepartmentOfHomelandSecurity, dhs, government, national security agency, NationalSecurityAgency, nsa, secret service, SecretService, top, white house, WhiteHouse

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