This week’s Golden Horseshoe is awarded to the Department of Energy’s cybersecurity office for spending $2.1 million for software it did not use, part of a broader pattern of deficiencies in budgetary oversight and workforce management planning.
A recent Office of Inspector General report investigated several allegations it received about questionable spending and a lack of internal controls at the DOE’s Office of Cybersecurity, Energy, Security and Emergency Response, which was formed to protect the nation’s energy infrastructure.
The investigation substantiated that “CESER purchased $2.1 million in cybersecurity data analysis software licenses which were to be used to monitor utility companies,” according to the inspection report, and “only a limited number of the licenses were provided to monitor utility companies more than a year after acquiring the software.”