Federal and State Policy Comparison A need for better coordination
Federal and State Policy Comparison
- A need for better coordination
Even though the federal government makes consistent significant steps towards improving cybersecurity goals through proper funding, the considerable challenges entail a decentralized approach for numerous security agencies where each entity is accountable for its cybersecurity operations. The common characteristic of this approach by the federal government is the absence ‘one-stop shop’ of all information, yet they serve the same goal, improving local and national cybersecurity (Moore, 2019). There is a lot of government data but is scattered across several agencies. This makes it difficult for people outside the information community circle to access such data and depicts an urgent need for better coordination among various information-sharing agencies.
- Cybersecurity budgets
Quite often, some reports criticize the state-level cybersecurity approach and have been termed a “weak link” towards building a reliable nation’s cybersecurity. Over the last decade, newspapers have given reports with headlines that indicated a severe need for more funding and staff (Hatcher et al., 2020). A study conducted by leading cybersecurity personnel from about fifty states noted that the primary issues concerning the state’s scope have remained unchanged, including a rise in cyber threats, a low supply of cybersecurity experts, and reduced budgets. The “2018 Deloitte – NASCIO cybersecurity study” (2018) noted that about 50% of the states lack an independent cybersecurity budget in the United States, and about 30% have not realized any growth in the budgets. Weighing the difference between implementing cybersecurity threat response techniques and accepting the associated risks would be cheaper to forego the latter option (Dean, 2019). It is costly to combat a cyber-attack after it has happened if the entity in question has no cybersecurity infrastructure. Atlanta, in 2017 lost about $2.6 million after failing to pay ransomware worth $52,000 (Dean, 2019). It was reported that Atlanta’s intrusion detection systems were obsolete but would have cost only $100,000 to upgrade. Budget constraints were associated with the delayed upgrade.
- Internal Threats
Regardless of how good cybersecurity infrastructure for federal or state may seem, no one is immune to new threats. Bisson (2018) published a report on the possibility that data belonging to about 240,000 Department of Homeland Security workers may have been exposed in a data breach attack. In 2017, the lead privacy officer for DHS indicated that a former employee had an unauthorized copy of the DHS’s investigations management system. According to their initial assessment, the employee had data about employment information, dates of birth, and social security number for 247,167 employees and other former employees in 2014 (Bisson, 2018). Additionally, the ex-employee had phone numbers, social security numbers, physical addresses, email addresses, and names for all people involved in federal case investigations from 2002 to 2014. This isolated event raises the question of employee privileges and national policies.
- Workplace policies
In the case detailed above, it seems employees are granted rights beyond what they should have. It is reasonable that all employees be given the least or minimum privileges that can enable them to perform their roles. If one employee could access over 240 000 pieces of information yet had already stopped working for the federal government, what kind of policies should be implemented to prevent a repeat of the same? Both federal and state cybersecurity policies should retrieve all equipment from personnel who no longer work for them (Bisson, 2018). This will prevent federal and state information exposure that could affect ongoing investigations or leak data about persons involved in the inquiry. There must be more stringent confidentiality agreements that ex-employees will not expose information they may have acquired from various agencies. For instance, after the 2017 data breach event, the DHS was forced to collaborate with local law enforcement agencies to technically evaluate elements of data exposed, conduct risk assessments for people whose data was leaked, and conduct a thorough forensic investigation of the data leaked while ensuring that ongoing investigations were not compromised (Bisson, 2018). Additionally, authentication systems should restrict all login credentials from containing dates of birth and personal information that could otherwise be obtained in case of a data breach. To combat a potential cybersecurity threat, state and federal agencies must review policies on who access l