Funding for Colorado Springs cybersecurity project gets little attention in lean budget year

DENVER – An $8 million earmark in Colorado’s $26 billion budget has attracted almost no public discussion or scrutiny.

The vague line-item in the 581 page budget is for “Concerning Colorado and The United States (bill to be introduced).”

In a lean fiscal year, even the state’s most ardent fiscal conservatives won’t speak ill of the Democratic governor’s set-aside for a burgeoning cybersecurity program in Colorado Springs.

In fact, the author of the yet-to-be introduced bill is Sen. Kent Lambert, a Colorado Springs Republican known for his penny-wise work on the Joint Budget Committee. Lambert said the bill will be introduced next week and will spend the money rehabilitating a donated building in Colorado Springs and launching a ramped up cybersecurtiy program at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs. For the full article click here 

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The Problem with Cyber Security

The early initial response by corporations, institutions, and government entities to combat cybercrime was to establish a barrier or a fence around their computer infrastructure. They wanted to setup a perimeter defense. However, always the creative types, criminal quickly found ways to circumvent these barriers. When you combine this ingenuity for pilfering with a few internal breaches by nefarious employees, organizations and corporate entities were forced to again revisit their cyber security perimeter and to question their strategy.

To combat the increased level of risk, organizations have been buying individual point product solutions to protect their databases located within the perimeter. Some of these solutions were designed to thwart any attack launched through e-mails, priority sign-in passwords,mobile applications accessed by employees or a combination of all three. The response was to throw the kitchen sink and more at the problem, which created IT departments deploying special, niche products from too many vendors that are unable to interact with each other. This leaves current Chief Information Officers with the task of consolidating disparate security measures and streamlining them into only one or two vendors who have successfully bundled the myriad of assorted products onto a single platform For the full article click here 

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Bulgaria’s National Security Council to Meet over Cybersecurity

Bulgarian President Rosen Plevneliev will convene the consultative council for national security on Thursday. The council brings together the prime minister, the parliament speaker, the defence, interior, foreign and finance ministers, the chairperson of the State Agency for National Security (DANS), the chief of defence and a representative from each of the parliamentary represented parties. The participants will review a report on the national policy in the field of cybersecurity and the steps for establshing a system for protection and countering cyber attacks. Another report will focus on the organisational, functional and resource capabilities needed for countering cyber attacks. For the full article click here 

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Microsoft, Uber execs and MasterCard CEO Ajay Banga named to US cybersecurity panel

The White House released a list of names that US President Barack Obama has appointed to the new Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity panel. The panel was formed earlier this year as part of Obama’s $19bn (£13bn) proposal to boost the US government’s cybersecuritysystem.

The panel includes top members of the tech, intelligence and academic communities. Among others appointed is CEO and president of MasterCard Ajay Banga; Microsoft Research’s Peter Lee, Uber chief security officer Joe Sullivan, former NSA director General Keith Alexander and Stanford cyberpolicy and security researcher Herbert Lin. In a statement, Obama said: “I have charged the Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity with the critically-important task of identifying the steps that our nation must take to ensure our cybersecurity in an increasingly digital world. These dedicated individuals bring a wealth of experience and talent to this important role, and I look forward to receiving the Commission’s recommendations.” For the full article click here 

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Cybersecurity course new option for Lawn School grads

Jamestown eighth-graders now have the option to earn their high school diplomas while working on a two-year associate’s degree.

Jamestowner Kerry Clarke, coordinator for the Newport Area Career & Technical Center, has introduced the Pathways in Technology Early College High School. Starting in September, incoming freshmen can study cybersecurity at the Community College of Rhode Island in Newport. Their regular classwork will be taught at an academy on the Rogers High Schoolcampus.

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Newport, Westerly and Providence will offer P-Tech. All Rhode Island students can apply, and college classes start as early as the summer after their freshmen year. For the full article click here 

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Terrorism, refugees and cybersecurity dominate journalism festival

Europe’s refugee crisis, reporting on terror and cybersecurity for both journalists and sources formed the focus of discussion at the International Journalism Festival in Perugia last week.

“We try and reflect what’s going on around us on our planet, and obviously security, terrorism, migration are issues which can hardly be avoided,” said festival co-founder Christopher Potter.

Peter Greste, imprisoned by Egyptian authorities for 400 days for reporting in the country, was warmly received in a packed Sala dei Notari to talk about how the war on terror was encroaching on the spaces where journalists are able to operate. He highlighted CPJ figures that more journalists have been killed or imprisoned in the past couple of years than at any time since before the 2000s.

He pointed out that internet journalists are the most likely to be imprisoned as governments increasingly see them as the most challenging to authorities. For the full article click here 

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Do US universities deserve an “F” in teaching cybersecurity?

The US alone has 210,000 cybersecurity jobs going unfulfilled, according to one recent estimate.

What’s more, the world’s next generation of programmers and IT pros are going to need a deep understanding of security, even if they aren’t “cybersecurity specialists.”

So, are they learning the security skills and mindsets they need? Not in the top universities in the United States, argues CloudPassage.

The topline claim from the company’s survey of 122 leading university computer science programs:US Universities Get “F” For Cybersecurity Education.

That’s a startling claim, so it’s worth exploring and reflecting on CloudPassage’s survey in a bit more detail.

CloudPassage’s research firm began by identifying the top 122 computer and information science programs in the United States, drawing on widely used lists from US News, Business Insider, and QS World. Next, it set standards for grading those programs. How many undergraduate courses in cybersecurity do they offer? How many are required for a student to earn a major in the field? For the full article click here 

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