Security at the Forefront

Liza Massey, Chief Information Officer, Information Services and Technology

Protect and Maintain the Integrity of County Data and Infrastructure

Protecting the public’s information held by the County is paramount. Data breaches have become commonplace in the news. How confident are you that County data is secure and is protected from being accessed and/or altered by hackers? Within the last two years these organizations experienced data breeches that exposed their customers’ or employees’ private information:

Target – 40 million card accounts
Home Depot – 56 million credit and debit cards
Federal Office of Personnel Management – 21.5 million federal workers
Anthem – 80 million patient records
JP Morgan Chase – 76 million households
Army National Guard – 850,000 SSNs and personal data

There have been hundreds more with smaller exposures including Harvard University, UPS, Goodwill Industries, Kmart, Staples, and Sony.

The only way we can avoid becoming another statistic is to make security a top priority. We will need to implement sound security policies and practices, embrace a Countywide understanding that security is everyone’s responsibility, and maintain a secure infrastructure that prevents unauthorized activity.