Key facts
- Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said in a video the FAA is moving from floppy disks to modern technology.
- The FAA awarded Leidos a contract in August 2020 to design and develop E-IDS.
- E-IDS will replace four separate information display systems used by air traffic controllers, per the FAA.
- An April 2026 Department of Transportation report said controllers used floppy-disk-driven systems for weather, NOTAMs and airport status.
- A September 2026 GAO report said legacy display systems rely on obsolete technology and manual update methods.
US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the Federal Aviation Administration is moving off floppy disks to a new information display platform, posting a video about the upgrade on November 5, 2026. "Good news America: floppy disks are out, 21st century tech is in," Duffy said in the published text. The video included a newscaster describing the FAA's outdated technology as essentially running on Windows 95.
Duffy credited President Trump for the upgrade, though the body says the plan was shepherded through by officials in both the Biden and Trump administrations. "The greatest nation in the world deserves a state-of-the-art air traffic control system, and under President Trump, we're delivering just that," Duffy said.
The new system, called E-IDS, was awarded to Leidos in August 2020 to design and develop, according to the FAA. Leidos said in a press release at the time that E-IDS is part of the FAA's Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen) modernization project, which encompasses numerous upgrades going back to 2008.
According to the FAA, E-IDS will replace the Information Display System 4 (IDS-4), Controller Equipment Information Display System (ACE-IDS), NAS Information Display System (NIDS), and En Route Information Display System (ERIDS).
An April 2026 Department of Transportation report said controllers used a system driven by floppy disks and an antiquated operating system for critical information such as weather, NOTAMs and airport status. With E-IDS, those controllers will have a single platform pulling that data into one view, the report said. A September 2026 US Government Accountability Office report criticized the legacy display systems as relying on obsolete technology and interfaces from the 1980s, inefficient data organization and manual update methods, and said the systems are cumbersome for controllers to search, retrieve and display information. The GAO said these systems are used in Air Route Traffic Control Centers, Terminal Radar Approach Control facilities and control towers, displaying information such as flight approach charts, notices to airmen and weather data needed for controller-to-pilot operations.