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The Government Accountability Office issued another scathing report saying that federal agencies still don't do enough to secure government IT assets. "Persistent weaknesses in information security policies and practices continue to threaten the confidentiality, integrity and availability of critical information and information systems used to support the operations, assets and personnel of most federal agencies," Gregory Wilshusen, GAO director of information security issues, wrote in a 66-page report issued Friday. "Recently reported incidents at federal agencies have placed sensitive data at risk, including the theft, loss, or improper disclosure of personally identifiable information of Americans, thereby exposing them to loss of privacy and identity theft." In a written response accompanying the report, federal CIO Vivek Kundra said OMB is committed to the vision of a secure federal government, and are taking steps to make that vision a reality. OMB, he said, has initiated a review of the language in the current reporting instructions to identify and clarify confusion in the annual reporting. OMB also is working with the CIO Council and the Council of Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency to improve guidance to agencies. The GAO report also said that nearly all of the 24 major federal agencies last year had weaknesses in information security controls. "An underlying reason for these weaknesses is that agencies have not fully implemented their information security programs," Wilshusen said. "As a result, agencies have limited assurance that controls are in place and operating as intended to protect their information resources, thereby leaving them vulnerable to attack or compromise."

1. You get what you pay for. 2. Americans do not take information or security as seriously as they do their love for profit & cost savings. If one does not value what they are trying to protect accurately, the investment one is prepared to make will always be insufficient. Then there are hindsight and rationalization (a.k.a. politicians) - Karl The Government Accountability Office issued another scathing report saying that federal agencies still don't do enough to secure government IT assets. "Persistent weaknesses in information security policies and practices continue to threaten the confidentiality, integrity and availability of critical information and information systems used to support the operations, assets and personnel of most federal agencies," Gregory Wilshusen, GAO director of information security issues, wrote in a 66-page report issued Friday. "Recently reported incidents at federal agencies have placed sensitive data at risk, including the theft, loss, or improper disclosure of personally identifiable information of Americans, thereby exposing them to loss of privacy and identity theft." In a written response accompanying the report, federal CIO Vivek Kundra said OMB is committed to the vision of a secure federal government, and are taking steps to make that vision a reality. OMB, he said, has initiated a review of the language in the current reporting instructions to identify and clarify confusion in the annual reporting. OMB also is working with the CIO Council and the Council of Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency to improve guidance to agencies. The GAO report also said that nearly all of the 24 major federal agencies last year had weaknesses in information security controls. "An underlying reason for these weaknesses is that agencies have not fully implemented their information security programs," Wilshusen said. "As a result, agencies have limited assurance that controls are in place and operating as intended to protect their inf

Government Information Security Podcasts Credit Eligible As a GovInfoSecurity.com annual member, this content can be used toward your membership credits and transcript tracking. Click For More Info Lessons Learned from TJX: Eric Fiterman, Cyber Crime Expert August 13, 2008 Interview with Cyber Crime Expert Eric Fiterman In the wake of the arrests of 11 hackers tied to the TJX data breach, security experts everywhere are warning of bigger, bolder threats to come. So, what should banking institutions have learned from TJX-style breaches, and what can they do now to protect their customers and critical financial/informational assets? In this interview, former FBI agent Eric Fiterman, founder of Methodvue, offers: Insights on the TJX and other breach investigations; How banking institutions can better protect their assets; The types of crimes institutions need to look out for in the months ahead.

Companies in the technology, media and telecommunications industries (TMT) significantly reduced investment in security spending in 2008, according to a new survey from Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu. The third edition of the Deloitte TMT Global Security Survey reveals that 32 percent of respondents reduced their information security budgets, while 60 percent of respondents believe they are "falling behind" or still "catching up" to their security threats -- a significant increase from 49 percent over the previous year. "This year's results indicate companies are explicitly scaling back. With funding decreasing and the threats increasing, it is more important than ever for TMT companies to be highly cost efficient in addressing their security risks," said Irfan Saif, a principal in Deloitte & Touche LLP's Audit and Enterprise Risk Services practice. "Companies that do not have a sound understanding of their security risk profile, or who under-invest in security now, may find themselves exposed to significant and increasingly sophisticated threats that they are not equipped to mitigate." With the proliferation of digitized assets, security should claim a significant portion of a company's overall IT budget. However, only 6 percent of respondents allocate 7 percent or more of their total budget to IT security. This year represents a significant decline from the previous edition of the survey, which showed that 36 percent of the respondents allocated 7 percent or more of their budget to IT security. The survey also indicates that declining security investment is hindering adoption of new security technologies, with only 53 percent of respondents considering their organizations to be early adopters, or part of the early majority, down from 67 percent in 2007. Companies are focusing more effort on optimizing solutions that are already in place rather than investing in cutting-edge technology that can be capitalized upon during economic recovery.

"Whether a patient comes in for a gall-bladder operation or to have a baby, the routine remains the same for staff at Sharp HealthCare hospitals in San Diego. The front desk checks insurance records to make sure the bills get paid on time. Nurses take vitals and tag their charges with a bar-coded wristband. And behind the scenes, fund-raisers scan the assets of each patient -- to find out whether they're "megarich," "wealthy" or merely "comfortable.""

Is that a microscope following me around? Must get more tin foil to keep them from seeing my thoughts.

Despite the recent revelations - and subsequent Congressional hearings - about the use (and misuse) of personal data by companies doing business on the Internet, companies aren't about to stop collecting and trying to use it to improve their results. And why should they, when the more data companies use, the better their chances of selling you more products and services, at better returns? According to Sandy Pentland, a professor at MIT's Media Lab, the best chance people may have of controlling their data online is a modern version of "if you can't beat them, join them."

In Deloitte's sixth annual Global Security Survey, people are the problem. "[P]eople continue to be an organization's greatest asset as well as its greatest worry," Adel Melek, global leader of security and privacy services at Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, said in the report. "That has not changed from 2007. What has changed is the environment. The economic meltdown was not at its peak when respondents took this survey. If there was ever an environment more likely to facilitate an organization's people being distracted, nervous, fearful, or disgruntled, this is it. To state that security vigilance is even more important at a time like this is an understatement." On one level, that couldn't be more obvious: It's not as if anyone worries about squirrels hacking servers; security has always been about people. (Robots, the report says, are unlikely to replace the human workforce during the lifetime of anyone reading the report. Finally, some good employment news.) Yet despite the obviousness of the problem, the obvious solution -- complete denial of access -- doesn't work. People use computers and computers are more useful when connected and it just gets worse from there. That may explain why identity and access management remained top of mind for survey respondents. Deloitte's survey, drawn from major financial companies around the globe, focuses on governance, investment, risk, use of security technologies, quality of operations, and privacy. It includes some good news -- external breaches have declined sharply over the past year -- and troublesome news -- fewer companies say they have the commitment and funding to address regulatory compliance. In terms of risk, specifically information systems failure, people are identified as the most significant vulnerability. "Human error is overwhelmingly stated as the greatest weakness this year (86%), followed by technology (a distant 63%)," the report states. It attributes the rising risk to increased adoption of new techno

The key points of the plan closely mirror recommendations offered late last year by a bipartisan commission of computer security experts, which urged then president-elect Obama to set up a high-level post to tackle cyber security, consider new regulations to combat cyber crime and shore up the security of the nation's most sensitive computer networks. The strategy, as outlined in a broader policy document on homeland security priorities posted on the Whitehouse.gov Web site Wednesday, states the following goals: * Strengthen Federal Leadership on Cyber Security: Declare the cyber infrastructure a strategic asset and establish the position of national cyber advisor who will report directly to the president and will be responsible for coordinating federal agency efforts and development of national cyber policy. * Initiate a Safe Computing R&D Effort and Harden our Nation's Cyber Infrastructure: Support an initiative to develop next-generation secure computers and networking for national security applications. Work with industry and academia to develop and deploy a new generation of secure hardware and software for our critical cyber infrastructure. * Protect the IT Infrastructure That Keeps America's Economy Safe: Work with the private sector to establish tough new standards for cyber security and physical resilience. * Prevent Corporate Cyber-Espionage: Work with industry to develop the systems necessary to protect our nation's trade secrets and our research and development. Innovations in software, engineering, pharmaceuticals and other fields are being stolen online from U.S. businesses at an alarming rate. * Develop a Cyber Crime Strategy to Minimize the Opportunities for Criminal Profit: Shut down the mechanisms used to transmit criminal profits by shutting down untraceable Internet payment schemes. Initiate a grant and training program to provide federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies the tools they need to detect and prosecute cyber crime. *

Is your bank on the list?

Failed Banks Thirty-six banks have failed this year, up from the 25 that shut down in 2008, which included Washington Mutual, the largest bank failure in US history. While the banks that have closed this year are not as large as WaMu, there have been some substantial banks that failed with assets in the billions. Click on to find out which of them rank as the 10 largest failures so far in 2009. Source: FDIC Posted June 4, 2009 »Slideshow: Largest Bankruptcies »Slideshow: World's Safest Banks

At last, my summer reading list is complete!

In what it described as an historic document, the National Institute for Standards and Technology issued a special report entitled Recommended Security Controls for Federal Information Systems and Organizations. Special Publication 800-53, Revision 3, is historic in nature. For the first time, and as part of a continuing initiative to develop a unified information security framework for the federal government and its contractors, NIST has included security controls in its catalog for national security and non-national security systems in its latest revision, No. 3, of Special Publication 800-53. "The important changes described (in the publication) are part of a larger strategic initiative to focus on enterprise-wide, near real-time risk management; that is, managing risks from information systems in dynamic environments of operation that can adversely affect organizational operations and assets, individuals, other organizations, and the nation," Ron Ross, NIST's Federal Information Security Management Act implementation project leader, said in a message incorporated into the 220-page report. According to the document, the updated security control catalogue incorporates best practices in information security from the Department of Defense, intelligence community and civilian agencies to produce the most broad-based and comprehensive set of safeguards and countermeasures ever developed for information systems.

The intersection of dr/bc, privacy & security should be preservation of business value.

What are the key elements of disaster recovery (DR) planning and design? While there's no one-size-fits-all solution, a data asset inventory that includes conducting a data classification project and assessing the potential risk for disaster from within your company will help you protect all of your data resources. In broad terms, you need to determine the recovery point objective (RPO) and recovery time objective (RTO) for different parts of the business and put together an effective data protection plan to achieve this. You should start by performing a business impact analysis.

In all of 2008, 40 banking institutions failed - 25 banks and 15 credit unions. So far in 2009, 72 institutions have either been closed or taken over by regulators, including 7 banks just this past weekend. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)'s troubled bank list, now at 305, has more than doubled from last year's total, when 117 banks were listed. Which begs the questions: Where and why are all these institutions failing, and how many more closures will we see by year's end? Failures by the Numbers Analysis of this year's bank/credit union failures (see interactive map) reveals some interesting facts: * Total Failed Banks: 64 * Total Failed Credit Unions: 8 o Top States For Failures: o Georgia - 16 banks o Illinois - 12 banks o California - 8 banks, 3 credit unions o Florida - 3 banks * Largest Failure BankUnited, Coral Gables, FL., $12.8 billion in assets, * Total Cost to FDIC Insurance Fund: $13.553 billion

Fun economic facts

Largest US Bankruptcies When automaker General Motors announced they were filing for bankruptcy today, the company joined the ranks of the largest companies in history to do so. Take a look at ten of the biggest corporate filings in US bankruptcy court, based on pre-bankruptcy assets. Source: BankruptcyData.com Updated June 1, 2009 »Slideshow: World's Biggest Debtor Nations »Slideshow: S&P's Leanest Companies

In my last post, Behavioral Targeting, I mentioned that I used a home-grown form of customer tracking when I worked on Wall Street. I explain a bit more about that in this post. I will describe more about the process in a second part to this post.
Early Adopters
The competition in the financial se

One of the things that always surprised me while working with corporate information over the years is the lack of a data classification program in the majority of firms. Working with many well-known corporations around the world, I get to see the inner-workings of how IT is practiced.

One item I

"Rep. Loretta Sanchez, Chair, House Armed Services Subcommittee on Terrorism, Unconventional Threats and Capabilities With many committees and subcommittees having oversight over government cybersecurity, Rep. Loretta Sanchez thinks it would be a good idea to gather them together to map out steps Congress can take to help secure government IT."

US Government agencies collaborate to help secure information assets & protect our infrastructure and citizens? What an idea!

Compared to other key corporate executives, CEOs appear to underestimate the IT security risks faced by their own organizations, according to a survey of C-level executives released today by the Ponemon Institute. The Ponemon survey (download PDF) of 213 CEOs, CIOs, COOs and other senior executives reveals what appears to be a perception gap between CEOs and other senior managers concerning information security issues. For instance, 48% of CEOs surveyed said they believe hackers rarely try to access corporate data. On the other hand, some 53% of other C-level executives believe that their company's data is under attack on a daily or even hourly basis. The survey also found that the top executives were less aware of specific security incidents at their companies than other C-level executives and are more confident that data breaches can be easily avoided. Ponemon found that CEOs tend to view data protection efforts as vital to maintaining good customer satisfaction levels and to the company's brand image. The other managers, however, were more likely to say that the most important role for data security efforts is to satisfy regulatory requirements. The survey also found that CEOs and other top managers differed in their opinion of who is responsible for protecting corporate data. While eight out of 10 respondents said they believe there is one person responsible for data protection in their organization, there was a sharp difference of opinion on just who that person was. More than half of the CEOs said that CIOs are responsible for protecting data at their companies; only 24% of other senior managers felt the same way. And 85% of respondents said someone else would be held responsible for a data breach. "On the issue of accountability, we found that while people acknowledged that data breaches were a problem, very few people felt that if [their company] suffered a breach, they would be held responsible," said Larry Ponemon, founder of the Ponemon Institute.

Compared to other key corporate executives, CEOs appear to underestimate the IT security risks faced by their own organizations, according to a survey of C-level executives released today by the Ponemon Institute. The Ponemon survey (download PDF) of 213 CEOs, CIOs, COOs and other senior executives reveals what appears to be a perception gap between CEOs and other senior managers concerning information security issues. For instance, 48% of CEOs surveyed said they believe hackers rarely try to access corporate data. On the other hand, some 53% of other C-level executives believe that their company's data is under attack on a daily or even hourly basis. The survey also found that the top executives were less aware of specific security incidents at their companies than other C-level executives and are more confident that data breaches can be easily avoided. Ponemon found that CEOs tend to view data protection efforts as vital to maintaining good customer satisfaction levels and to the company's brand image. The other managers, however, were more likely to say that the most important role for data security efforts is to satisfy regulatory requirements. The survey also found that CEOs and other top managers differed in their opinion of who is responsible for protecting corporate data. While eight out of 10 respondents said they believe there is one person responsible for data protection in their organization, there was a sharp difference of opinion on just who that person was. More than half of the CEOs said that CIOs are responsible for protecting data at their companies; only 24% of other senior managers felt the same way. And 85% of respondents said someone else would be held responsible for a data breach. "On the issue of accountability, we found that while people acknowledged that data breaches were a problem, very few people felt that if [their company] suffered a breach, they would be held responsible," said Larry Ponemon, founder of the Ponemon Institute.