Chances are that your IT shop (and most others) faces accusations every day. IT has its own set of goals and concerns that must come first. When these facts come into conflict with your user’s needs or wants, then something has got to give.

IT is currently facing two dilemmas. The first is many want their private cloud architecture to work with their existing data center. Secondly, IT professionals are looking to build private clouds that are open to other clouds but also equipped to run existing in-house systems and applications. So you may be asking yourself, “Why should I build a private cloud?”

This week in Technically News: One Small Step for NASA, One Giant Leap for Open Source; Chinese Hack Targets Weapons’ Designs; SolarWinds Raises Profile in Cloud-Based IT Management; 30 Years of Accumulation: A Timeline of Cloud Computing; Tracking the Evolution of Big Data: A Timeline.

In this week's Technically News: 5 Reasons the Government Needs to be More Like the Tech Industry; Lawmakers: What’s Still Missing in Data Center Consolidation; 5 Keys to Getting Big Data Under Control; Oracle: 4 Reasons Why Information Silos are Hindering Cloud Advantages; Amazon Web Services Gains FedRAMP Compliance for GovCloud; CloudCheckr Monitors Amazon GovCloud.

The GovDefenders Cybersecurity Event is now on-demand! Register and gain access to eight educational sessions, two keynotes, a panel, and over 100 cybersecurity resources from the world's top IT providers - for free.

In this week's Technically Speaking: DDoS Attacks Triple in 2012; Amazon Cloud Adds Protection Against DoS Attacks; Two States Overhaul IT to Boost Social Services; Six Open Source Security Myths Debunked; A Checklist for Keeping Mobile Apps Secure.

In this week's Technically News: Students Face Cyber War Game with NSA Hackers; Red Hat’s “PaaS Queen” on OpenStack; 6 Steps to Secure Systems for Sequester; SolarWinds’ Firewall Security Manager Reviewed; DLT Solutions Finds Promise in State & Local Work.

In this week's Technically News: Can Open Standards Help During the Next Major Disaster; The Search Engine That Finds Everything; DISA Moving Exabytes to the Cloud; Cybersecurity Budgets Increase Across Departments; How Do You Tax the Cloud; U.S. Navy Looks to the Cloud

John Nicholson is the President of the Washington D.C. Metro Chapter of the Cloud Security Alliance (CSA) and one of the keynote speakers during this year's GovDefenders Cybersecurity Virtual Event. In preparation for the big event, we briefly interviewed John about cloud computing. Watch the below video to learn: "What resources can the Federal cloud community tap into regarding contracting and best practices?" and "How can cloud providers leverage the CSA's Cloud Controls Matrix and are there any currently leveraging it?"

The GovDefenders Cybersecurity Virtual Event, presented by DLT Solutions, is a free cyber event focused on the public sector. Join us from your desk on Wednesday, April 24 as professionals from leading IT companies, including NetApp, Symantec, ForeScout, Red Hat, Quest Software, now a part of Dell, SolarWinds, and DLT Solutions, as we discuss trends, best practices, and the future of public sector cybersecurity.