HUD Information Resources - Strategic Focus and Improved Management Controls Needed: Aimd-94-34 (Paperback)

GAO reviewed the effectiveness of the Department of Housing and Urban Development's (HUD) information resources management (IRM) program, focusing on whether: (1) IRM planning and data management are adequate to support HUD missions and strategic objectives; (2) HUD computer security programs adequately protect sensitive systems; and (3) efforts to integrate and strengthen financial management systems are effectively planned and managed. GAO found that: (1) HUD information systems are poorly integrated, ineffective, and do not meet HUD management or control needs; (2) HUD ability to fully utilize IRM resources to satisfy its missions and strategic objectives is significantly limited because it lacks strategic IRM planning and has not resolved long-standing information system problems; (3) HUD IRM plans are not based on strategic business plans that identify department missions or the strategies, processes, resources, and information needed to achieve these missions; (4) HUD lacks a departmentwide information architecture and a data management program to govern the management and use of IRM information resources and meet program managers' information requirements; (5) HUD has not established adequate computer security controls to ensure that its sensitive data are protected against unauthorized access and major disruption; (6) HUD efforts to resolve long-standing financial management weaknesses have been hindered by ineffective planning and management oversight; and (7) HUD needs to strengthen its commitment to strategic planning and fully implement actions to address data management, computer security, and financial systems integration weaknesses to resolve its long-standing information management and control problems.