To do so, Bloomington will need to continuously update its technical infrastructure and facilities, ITS director Craig McBeath told the Bloomington City Council on Monday while presenting a draft of the department's strategic plan.
"There's no financial commitment to this plan, it's simply a shared understanding of how to advance the city's vision," McBeath said, adding that any major purchases would be requested through the typical budgeting process.
Included in the three-year plan are 24 goals, ranging from updating equipment and expanding storage capacity to training staff and implementing a Freedom of Information Act management system.
Also included in the plan are upgrades to publicly-accessible wireless internet and the city's cybersecurity measures, like internal firewalls.
Ward 5 Ald. Nick Becker, who works as an administrator for a data storage company, said those features are only effective if the "foundation is in place."
"Very, very typical with all the government agencies that we deal with that this is the case — the infrastructure is out of date, some software somewhere some component is so off of maintenance that it just cascades and causes major problems," Becker said.
Ward 9 Ald. Tom Crumpler asked what kinds of cybersecurity would be in place if the city was attacked by ransomware or "held hostage" by hackers.
Without revealing too many details, McBeath said Bloomington's current practices are "the best possible to anticipate any kind of security breach or hack."
Those include back-ups and security measures based on recommendations from the state and federal governments, McBeath said.
He added that the ITS department also actively monitors "active security incidents" especially during election periods and works to "prevent anything that we possibly can."
McBeath added that cybersecurity is an area that the department expects to develop through an area-wide security consortium with Illinois State University and Illinois Wesleyan University.
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