By Chris Corum, Editor

The Government Services Administration (GSA) was instrumental in the federal agencies’ successful compliance with last year’s October 27 deadline for PIV card issuance. That is because the GSA’s HSPD-12 Managed Services Office (MSO) actually issued the cards for 39 contracted agencies. It is outsourcing at the federal level–agencies heads not wishing to handle their card issuance and HSPD-12 compliance internally can hire an outside entity to do it for them. And that is precisely what the MSO is there for.