Executive Director Message
Continuing Our Mission During Uncertain Times
The coronavirus has disrupted every aspect of life as we know it. My message this month is to assure you that the mission and objectives of the Secure Technology Alliance will continue through these uncertain times. Although our personal interactions will be limited, the virtual nature of our member-driven industry and technology councils will continue to foster industry collaboration within each specified industry or market segment. Despite disruptions to our personal and business routines, we expect the councils will continue to produce tangible results.
I hope you are healthy, as are family members, friends, and colleagues. You may very well have changes in business priorities, be asked to juggle multiple projects, work with reduced staff, experience a change in your working environment that presents its own distractions, or have numerous other challenging situations. We understand that you may have constantly unfolding changes and situations that will define how you work and live.
Prior to taking over as Executive Director of the Alliance in 2001, the Alliance maintained an office and staff in lower Manhattan. After the Sept. 11 attacks, all businesses in the affected area were forced to close down and transportation was a nightmare. My first action was to get our operations moved to a remote environment. Since then, the staff and I – from New Jersey to California – have worked in home offices, communicating daily through scheduled weekly calls, web conferencing, instant messaging services, email and other remote platforms that allow us to be connected at all times. Because this has been normal for us, our pattern of work and communication is unchanged. As a result, the staff continues to work in such an environment, able to remain healthy, productive, and sheltered-in-place as per state orders.
Regarding Alliance activities, we were fortunate to get in our highly successful and valued Payments Summit conference in February just as the warning bells of a pandemic were beginning to sound. We acted quickly to postpone the much anticipated Securing Federal Identity event, our government identity and security conference, from June to September to provide more time to evaluate if and when it will be safe for our members to gather in person again. Our classroom training and certification programs, the CSCIP, CSEIP, and TSCIP have been suspended, except for our CSEIP re-certification classes which are online only.
We’ve been moving forward with other industry projects and initiatives. Our mobile driver’s license (mDL) project team released the white paper it had been working on and is scheduling a series of lunch and learn webinars beginning on April 30th. Our Payments Council, Transportation Council, and Access Control Councils have active projects and continue meeting regularly to collaborate on new resources to accelerate the adoption of new mobility and security technologies in those markets. A list of these projects can be found here.
The entire staff and I send our best wishes to you for continued health and safety during this unprecedented time. If you should have any questions or want to discuss any matter with me, please feel free to reach out to me at [email protected] or by calling my direct office number at 1-609-587-4208.
Sincerely,
Randy Vanderhoof
Executive Director, Secure Technology Alliance
Securing Federal Identity 2020-Rescheduled Date
Out of an abundance of caution about how the COVID-19 virus is continuing to impact government and business, we have rescheduled the Securing Federal Identity Conference that was planned for June to its new date, September 16-17, 2020. The health and safety of our sponsors, speakers and attendees is our top priority. We will continue to monitor the situation and are following the directions of the CDC and Arlington, VA health authorities. We will post any changes if other decisions affecting the Securing Federal Identity 2020 event are made.
Follow the Alliance on Social Media
The Secure Technology Alliance has enhanced its presence on social media with robust platforms on Twitter and LinkedIn. Here are some ways you can interact with the organization: