Cybersecurity

With more than 23 years of IT leadership experience in North Carolina, Rob Main will work with CIO James Weaver to reinforce the state's cybersecurity programs and infrastructure as the state's new chief risk officer.

Massachusetts’ fifth annual Cybersecurity Forum focused on three of the biggest cyber topics today: fighting ransomware, expanding the cybersecurity workforce and anticipating a U.S. central bank digital currency.

The company is making its cybersecurity curriculum available to all community colleges across the country, offering 25,000 scholarships and training faculty at 150 locations in hopes of filling 250,000 jobs by 2025.

Hackers exploited a vulnerability in out-of-date Atlassian software used by the University of Colorado Boulder and compromised the data of about 30,000 people. No financial info or Social Security numbers were leaked.

Earlier this month, UMass Memorial Health, a health-care system in Worchester, Mass., informed 209,048 patients that their private information may have been compromised due to an email-related data breach.

Deputy Chief Information Officer Neal Underwood of Louisiana has his staff focused on being ready for catastrophic infrastructure failure so if the worst ever happens, they can rebound quickly.

It’s often said that people are the problem in IT security, but ensuring staff are engaged with cyber protocol, having a strong plan in place, and coordinating efforts across state and local agencies can stop attacks.

Washington Secretary of State Kim Wyman will resign to take a key federal election security position, serving as the senior election security lead for the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA).

Microsoft suspects that Nobelium, the group of state-sponsored Russian cyber criminals responsible for the SolarWinds fiasco, is taking aim at suppliers and resellers of tech products, including cloud-based solutions.

How should schools prepare digital natives — children who have never known a world without social media and personal digital devices — for the world wide web? Half a dozen principles can help guide the conversation.

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer announced Monday the appointment of Laura Clark to the position of chief information officer. Clark will also continue to serve in her role as the state’s chief security officer.

Educators are concerned about killware, the latest type of cyber attack, which can cause deaths by disabling life-and-death technological systems such as hospital networks or public utilities like water and power.

Some of the unemployment system’s challenges include processing large numbers of claims, protecting people’s personal information and state lawmakers not knowing the extent of the system’s operational problems.

Janesville School District in Wisconsin said no data was accessed or destroyed, but students, staff and families are without programs such as Infinite Campus, Classlink, web-based textbooks and other resources.

Cyber criminals could take advantage of natural disasters such as hurricanes, wildfires and tornadoes to wreak havoc on critical infrastructure, including transportation, emergency response, water systems and hospitals.

The U.S. Treasury Department has estimated the first six months of 2021 saw a total of $590 million connected to ransomware. In 2020, the number for the entire year was only $410 million.

The idea behind killware, a new type of cyber attack, is to disable or manipulate the electronic or computer equipment that humans depend on, resulting in potential harm or death to individuals.

States readying for the 2022 midterms will need to be prepared to push out truthful information to counteract the spread of fears and false narratives, and holdout states should adopt paper ballots.