A new report, Understanding the Federal Government’s ‘IT Insecurity’ Crisis, released today by the International Association of Information Technology Asset Managers (IAITAM), has the group claiming that “half or more of the $70-$80 billion the U.S. government spends each year on Information Technology (IT) and IT Security is wasted.”
Dr. Barbara Rembiesa, the report’s author, found that the government spends more than $36,000 per employee on IT — “an astonishing six times more per employee on IT than does private industry.”
And at some departments, the levels of IT spending per employee reaches extreme levels, as much as 30 times higher than what private companies average: “$168,000 per U.S. Department of Education employee and more than $109,000 per U.S. State Department employee,” reads the report.
In a press release promoting the report, Rembiesa writes, “Right now, we have the high-tech equivalent of the $436 Pentagon hammer and it’s just getting worse” and that “simply throwing more dollars at Information Technology (IT) and IT security is not a solution for anything other than mind-boggling waste of public funds.”
The Ohio-based trade association is run by Rembiesa, and administers internationally accepted certifications for information technology professionals. Naturally, the group thinks that applying its certifications and best practices would be a better solution, with Rembiesa adding:
“Federal IT chiefs often cite inadequate funding as the biggest inhibitor to progress, but a thorough investigation of the overall federal government IT sector reveals that cost savings and IT security would be increased by a comprehensive ITAM program at the national government level in the U.S.”
You can read the whole report here.
