Committee to hold five hearings in June on VA IT Security
 

Washington, DC — As Chairman Steve Buyer pushes for answers and solutions from the Department of Veterans Affairs, the committee will continue its oversight responsibility to investigate the pervasive problems and vulnerabilities within VA’s IT architecture.

 “We must act promptly, yet we must also understand what went wrong at VA so that we can prevent it from happening again. We will conduct an aggressive series of hearings to give us the information we need to both remedy any harm done to veterans by this incident and fix the problems in the system,” said Chairman Buyer

“VA has to prepare to mitigate any damage to veterans if their information is sold,” Buyer said to reporters yesterday, after a closed roundtable discussion with industry, VA and Government Accountability Office IT representatives about VA’s data security.

“That means I might have to create a claims adjudication process, similar to what the military does,” said Buyer.  VA would have to gain authority for this additional claims process from Congress.

House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs will hold five hearings this month on the VA data theft and IT security:

• June 14, the VA IG and GAO will testify before the committee as cyber security recommendations from past VA IG and GAO reports are considered.
   

• June 20, the Subcommittee on Disability Assistance and Memorial Affairs will hold a joint hearing with the Subcommittee on Economic Opportunity on the VA data theft and cyber security procedures at the Veterans Benefits Administration. Included in that discussion will be an examination of security measures to ensure fiduciaries are protecting sensitive client information.
   

• June 22, academic and industry experts will testify on operational aspects of IT security and the VA general counsel have been invited to testify on legal implications.
   

• June 28, examination the role of VA’s Chief Information Officer and the department’s Office of Information and Technology structure and operations.
   

• June 29, VA Secretary Jim Nicholson will testify before the full committee, providing an update on the status of the VA data theft.