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CIO Update for the Week of Jun 2

There is a lot of information in this week’s CIO Blog

For the week of June 2, the following items of general interest are worth commenting on:

News

New

  • IT Governance

    • The Administrative Computing Council meets Monday at 1:00 p.m.
    • The CIOs meet for their monthly Chat Tuesday at 4:00 p.m.

     

  • IT Vendors

    • CGI sent us this message after their Agentic AI Lunch & Learn:
      • Thank you again for the opportunity to engage with the Texas A&M IT leadership community and explore the exciting and emerging topic of Agentic AI. We truly appreciated the platform to connect, exchange ideas, and spark meaningful conversation around the potential of this transformative technology As a follow-up, I’ve attached the presentation materials from our session
      • Thanks again for your partnership; we look forward to future conversations

     

  • A series of targeted phishing attacks against multiple A&M System members over the past several years where attackers use social engineering, credential harvesting, and “push-bombing” to bypass current multi-factor authentication (MFA) has resulted in multiple security incidents causing financial loss and business interruption to those affected system members

    Texas A&M System Cybersecurity, in consultation with the A&M System Executive IT Council, recommends the immediate implementation of phish-resistant MFA (such as Duo’s Verified Push) for all authentication events, and the elimination of voice call MFA options

    SMS one-time code authentication may also be eliminated for added security

  • June 24 HUB Event

    • The event has been moved to the RELLIS Chapel
    • The HUB office is lookiinng for two more IT Forum Panelists; please see the June 2 email for more information

     

Repeats

  • IT Vendors

    • Adobe
      • Adobe will be in College Station June 3 from 10:00 a.m. – 2:00 p.m. to showcase their products in preparation for contract renewal
      • The meeting will be at the A&M System IT Shared Services building; the building address and a Teams link was sent through email
    • A&M System IT Business Forum for IT-focused Businesses and HUB Vendors
      • Mark your calendar for June 24 from 9:30 a.m. to 10:45 a.m. (before the June CIO Council)
      • A registration link and updated agenda was sent through email

  • Cyber Operations and Workday Services have developed a formal process to respond in the event of a suspected payroll or other identity compromise; details are being shared with CIOs, CFOs, payroll leadership and others

System-Wide Contracting News

New

  • UPD RMS RFP: Best and final bids will be requested of the three finalists this week

In Process

  • A&M System-wide Contracts Under Development:

    • CRM (Blackbaud, Technolutions and UC Innovations executed; Anthology is with the vendor)
    • Mass Notification RFP (Rave, Everbridge, Summus agreements pending; Critical Arc agreement executed)
    • Web Hosting RFP (Low Code solutions (Duda is with procurement, Squiz is with with the vendor, WebFlow is on hold) WordPress solutions (Vertosoft is executed, Pantheon is with OGC))

Repeats

  • Current A&M System-wide Contracts

    • 3 Play Media provides closed captioning services (discretionary)
    • Acadeum provides access to an online education marketplace that offers courses across a network of colleges and universities to help students stay on track and graduate faster (discretionary)
    • Accelevents supports virtual and hybrid conferences (discretionary)
    • Accenture provides data management services (discretionary)
    • AdmitHub fosters student success with artificial intelligence-powered mobile messaging and chatbots (discretionary)
    • Adobe provides business software and services, including Creative Cloud, Acrobat Pro, Captivate, FrameMaker and Sign (discretionary)
    • airSlate / SignNow provides electronic signature and related workflow capabilities (discretionary)
    • AT&T provides network as a service and related services (discretionary)
    • Aten Design Group provides web development services (discretionary)
    • Barkley provides web development services (discretionary)
    • BerryDunn provides data management services (discretionary)
    • Blackbaud provides cloud-based fundraising and CRM services (discretionary)
    • Blackboard (Anthology) provides a cloud-based learning management system (discretionary)
    • Campus Works provides Banner SIS services (discretionary)
    • Canvas (Instructure) provides a cloud-based learning management system (discretionary)
    • CGI provides data management services (discretionary)
    • Cisco Strategic Relationship supports the AT&T NaaS RELLIS services and includes discounted Cisco products and services (discretionary)
    • Columbia Advisory Group provides Banner SIS services (discretionary)
    • CriticalArc provides safety, security and emergency management solutions (discretionary)
    • D2L provides a cloud-based learning management system (discretionary)
    • Daman Inc. provides data management services (discretionary)
    • Deloitte provides data management services (discretionary)
    • Diligent provides board portal functionality (discretionary)
    • DocuSign provides electronic signature and related workflow capabilities (discretionary)
    • Duo (Cisco) provides two-factor authentication (discretionary)
    • eXplorance allows students to evaluate academic courses and instructors (discretionary)
    • Fetii provides contactless scanning technology through QR codes (discretionary)
    • GoReact provides a platform for feedback, grading and critiquing of video assignments (discretionary)
    • GovQA (Granicus) is the TAMUS approved Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) solution (assessed)
    • Guardian I-9 (Equifax) provides electronic I-9 compliance verification (discretionary)
    • Honorlock provides online proctoring services (discretionary)
    • Hootsuite enables members to manage social networks, schedule messages and measure social media from a dashboard (discretionary)
    • Interfolio provides academic faculty management software (discretionary)
    • Inventive Works provides web development services (discretionary)
    • IOTA Solutions allows students to evaluate academic courses and instructors (discretionary)
    • KTech Products provides an AI-powered chatbot designed for students, managing both academic and non-academic interactions (discretionary)
    • Laserfiche provides document digitization and automated records processing, storage retrieval, security and archiving (discretionary)
    • LinkedIn Learning provides video courses taught by industry experts in software, creative and business skills (discretionary)
    • Meazure Learning provides on-line proctoring services (discretionary)
    • Microsoft provides business software and services (direct bill)
    • Modo Labs supports mobile application development (discretionary)
    • Navex provides on-line proctoring services (discretionary)
    • NewCity Media provides web development services (discretionary)
    • NextGen provides electronic signature and related workflow capabilities (discretionary)
    • OculusIT provides Banner SIS services (discretionary)
    • Oracle provides a shared hardware/software platform to host Oracle-based applications (discretionary)
    • Palo Alto provides firewalls and associated security subscription services (discretionary)
    • PlatformQ enables universities to connect with students at every stage of the recruitment process (discretionary)
    • Pluralsight offers a variety of video-based training for software developers, IT administrators and creative professionals (discretionary)
    • Proctorio provides on-line proctoring services (discretionary)
    • Proviti provides data management services (discretionary)
    • Qualtrics provides an online survey tool that supports building and distributing surveys and analyzing the responses (discretionary)
    • Salesforce Government Cloud provides customer relationship management software (discretionary)
    • SimpsonScarborough provides web development services (discretionary)
    • Siteimprove checks web pages, every five days, for spelling, grammar, broken links, and accessibility (assessed)
    • Smart Net (Cisco) provides Cisco equipment maintenance (discretionary)
    • SmarterServices provides on-line proctoring services (discretionary)
    • SmartEvals (Gap Technologies) allows students to evaluate academic courses and instructors (discretionary)
    • Sprout Social provides a social media management platform (discretionary)
    • Sterling provides background check services for employment, employment screening, drug testing, I-9 employment and education verification (discretionary)
    • Strata Information Group provides Banner SIS services (discretionary)
    • Stova supports virtual and hybrid conferences (discretionary)
    • Summus Industries provides data management services (discretionary)
    • TaxBandits (SpanEnterprises) provides e-file services for Forms W-2, W-9, 1099, 94x and 1095
    • TeamDynamix provides cloud-based IT service and project management software (discretionary)
    • Verbit provides closed captioning services (discretionary)
    • Vertosoft provides WordPress services (discretionary)
    • VisionPoint Marketing provides web development services (discretionary)
    • VMware provides various VMware software, services and training/consulting credits (discretionary)
    • WebEx (Cisco) provides online collaboration and meeting software (discretionary)

Travel

  • Austin (Jun 4-5)