Cybersecurity, big data top priorities for state’s IT chief

Dewand Neely is the chief information officer for the state of Indiana, overseeing a 300-plus employee operation that is the sole provider of IT services to about 100 state agencies. He’s been at the Indiana Office of Technology since its inception in 2005 (agencies previously had their own IT teams and resources), and he assumed the helm in October 2015 after Paul Baltzell stepped down.

Neely, 38, recently spoke with IBJ about cybersecurity, the innovation his office is driving, and being one of only a few African-American state government CIOs in the country. The following are edited excerpts from that conversation.

IBJ: You’ve been in your job for a little over a year now. How have you made your mark on this office?

NEELY: I came in [in 2005] as an infrastructure guy a few years out of school and was lucky enough to be one of the first folks to work with the newly created Office of Technology. One of the things I remember early on is the struggle we had with changing the culture when we started doing consolidated IT—how much we had to bend over backward to make sure we were being customer-service focused and delivering value to win over people who were against consolidation.

One of the things I did right away after [becoming CIO] was to really put another focus on that. We were doing some really cool things, but sometimes that work can get in the way of the customer service. For the full article click here 

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Trump Presidency: Where does cyber security go now?

Given the unexpected results of the US election, it is hard to predict the future, particularly in sorting out campaign rhetoric from policy intent. In general, Trump’s pro-jobs, pro-business resolve will likely loosen constraints on companies in terms of industry regulations and taxation while supporting employee expansion and capital investments.

Trump will need to reconcile his image as a populist Washington outsider who will champion the common man with the business leader that will ease burdens and restrictions.

Changes will be made to cyber security – this is nearly certain. The election itself was highly charged with security issues that created at the very least tension, and at its height, a kind of hysteria. A string of email attacks that ensnared DNC leaders and even Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager revealed the impact that cyber warfare can have on a national election. For the full article click here 

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Autistic People Can Solve Our Cybersecurity Crisis

ALAN TURING WAS the mastermind whose role in cracking the Nazi Enigma code helped the Allies win World War II. He built a machine to do the calculations necessary to decipher enemy messages and today is hailed as the father of the com­puter and artificial intelligence. He’s also widely believed to have been autistic.

Turing was not diagnosed in his lifetime, but his mathematical genius and social inelegance fit the profile for autism spectrum disorder (ASD). And his story illustrates how society benefits when it gives a voice to those who think different. Until he came along, no one perceived the need for a com­puter; they simply needed to crack the code. It took a different kind of mind to come up with that unexpected, profoundly consequential solution.

While Turing’s renown has arguably never been higher, today we are failing to recognize the potential in millions of other talented minds all around us. Like Turing, many of them are also capable of exceptional technological expertise that can help to safeguard our nation. For the full article click here

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Cyber security must go beyond the traditional

The world is engaged in an invisible war, with honest businesses at one end and cybercriminals at the other. Cyber security is no longer just a concern, but is inevitable, writes NITHEN NAIDOO, CIO of Snode

Cybersecurity is no longer just a pressing concern for the IT industry, it is a very real issue that every business has to contend with. Put plainly, a cyberattack is not just likely, it’s inevitable.

What’s more, many organisations’ security can already have been compromised, without them necessarily knowing even it. Today’s security landscape is no longer defined by the known and familiar attack vectors, responded to by the traditional defences of installing a firewall, antivirus solutions and constantly updated threat signatures. Rather, companies are being attacked in ways they cannot predict and often, don’t even detect using traditional approaches to cybersecurity.

Furthermore, companies are understandably reluctant to share details of how and when their security has been compromised, for fear of their reputations being damaged. This is exacerbated by the fact that they are facing advanced, highly motivated, and extremely well organised attackers, who are globally dispersed and often part of a much larger crime syndicate. This gives cybercriminals a structural advantage, making it all the more likely that they will continue to win the battles they wage. For the full article click here

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BLETCHLEY PARK CHOSEN SITE FOR CYBER SECURITY COLLEGE

Bletchley Park has been chosen as the site for the UK’s first National College of Cyber Security.

The plans were confirmed by the not-for-profit cyber security body QUFARO, with intentions to open the site by 2018. The new facility will be built at the site’s G-Block, which is one of the facility’s largest buildings. At present, a £5million restoration project is being conducted to convert the building to a security technology centre.

The college will be a free-to-attend boarding school for up to five hundred 16-to-19 year olds. Pupils are to be selected on talent regardless of background, and taught cyber skills as well as a range of related subjects. The programme is intended to help increase the UK’s potential for helping young people learn cyber security skills, in the face of the increased threat of cyber warfare.

The site is to be built at the historic location where codebreakers including Alan Turing broke the Enigma code during World War Two. For the full article click here

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Internet Society: Change Cybersecurity Stance

“Once bitten, twice shy” is the sentiment among many consumers when it comes to companies that were the subject to a data breach. A new report from the Internet Society finds that 59 percent of Internet users said they would not likely do business with a company that fell victim to a data hack.

“One of the key questions raised by this report is, why are organizations doing so little to protect their customers’ data?” said Michael Kende, economist and Internet Society fellow who authored the report, in a press release. “Everyone knows that data security is a major issue for both consumers and businesses, yet companies are not doing everything they could to prevent breaches.”

According to the Internet Society, the average cost of a data breach is now about $4 million, up 29 percent since 2013. What’s more, in 2015 there were a reported 1,673 breaches and 707 million exposed records. With that in mind, the Internet Society said it is urging companies to change their stance on cybersecurity and follow some key recommendations. For the full article click here

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Cyber Security – Technologies & Global Markets – Key Vendors Are Palo Alto, Fireeye & Symantec Corp. – Research and Markets

DUBLIN–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Research and Markets has announced the addition of the “Cyber Security: Technologies and Global Markets” report to their offering.

The scope of the report encompasses various technologies used in cyber security applications. Additionally, the application industry for the market is segmented into banking and financial services institutions, defense and intelligence, healthcare, retail, IT and telecommunications, government, and others, which include education and manufacturing sectors. The present cyber security market offers an opportunity to the stakeholders, largely because of a surge in cloud-based services and the increased use of the internet for online financial transactions.

This report highlights different solutions in the cyber security market, which includes identity and access management (IAM), encryption, data loss protection (DLP), firewall, antivirus and antimalware, disaster recovery, risk and compliance management, and other solutions. Other types of solutions include unified threat management (UTM), distributed denial of service mitigation and web filtering. In addition, the report also offers major regional analysis of the Americas, Europe Middle East and Africa (EMEA), and Asia-Pacific. The estimated and forecast market revenue considered in this report is the summation of prices for software, hardware and subscription services. For the full article click here 

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