SSC data center to upgrade

The Department of Homeland Security will embark on a 10-year cloud computing initiative to modernize its technology infrastructure and improve its cybersecurity posture, according to a Feb. 19 announcement. The program calls for modernizing Data Center 1 (DC 1) at NASA's Stennis Space Center (SSC), Miss., and retiring by June 2020 DC 2 in Virginia, migrating a majority of its IT systems and data to the cloud. The program could be worth a combined $1 billion to $2 billion for multiple cloud vendors over the next 10 years, according to a Bloomberg Government analysis. The scope of DHS's program resembles the Defense Department's Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) cloud program, but where JEDI will be a centralized cloud that provides the bulk of the Pentagon's infrastructure-as-a-service needs, DHS's will rely on multiple vendors and hybrid systems capable of running in both on-premise and cloud environments. Responses to the Request for Information are due March 20, 2019. The RFI says it's looking at "right sizing our footprint in Data Center 1 to support optimization of that facility." CSC Government Solutions (spun off from CSC into CSRA, which was acquired by General Dynamics IT) has operated the DC 1 at SSC's National Center for Critical Information Processing and Storage since July 2008. The site itself is government-owned. DC 1 is some 63,000 square feet and consists of three large attached buildings. DC 1 and DC 2 are the result of a previous consolidation that saw the IT infrastructure of the agencies under its purview limited to just two sites. (Sources: Bloomberg Government, 02/22/19, Data Center Dynamics, 02/21/19)