Cyber Security in the Government Sector Business
We've got some great deals going on right now exclusively for our online customers... chat now to hear more! Cyber security in the government sector: The role of state and local governments,Author: Mark Stone,A quick scan of the could give the impression that cyber security in the government sector is only a concern for the federal government, due to references to federal agencies or because cyber attacks seemingly only originate overseas. Yet this would be misleading—Barracuda Networks research indicates that 44% of global ransomware attacks in 2020 . Public sector cyber security is very much a concern for state and local governments, with experts describing them as .,Why state and local governments are targeted,A 2020 International City/County Management Association (ICMA) report on identified five key reasons these governments are targeted:,Examples of cyber security attacks in the government sector,According to the Verizon 2021 Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR), the after the entertainment industry. The 15th anniversary edition of the DBIR is available May 24th, 2022, . Notably, the report treats education and healthcare as different sectors, some of which are also government operated. Examples of recent state and local public sector cyber security attacks include:,Common public sector cyber security attack methods,According to the , social engineering is the most common attack method in relation to cyber security in the government sector. In the 2021 DBIR, over 69% of breaches were due to social engineering, with phishing emails the most prominent vector. The report found that the public sector is particularly vulnerable to attackers who can craft a credible phishing email. Public sector attackers were overwhelmingly interested in obtaining credentials, with 80% of incidents attempting to steal logins and passwords that would further the attacker's presence in the intended victim's network and systems. After phishing, miscellaneous errors placed a distant second as a cause of public sector cyber security incidents. Those errors consisted of misconfiguration and misdelivered emails and paper documents. Other critical threats to cyber security in the government sector include and improper internal usage of systems. For the latest statistics and findings, . The challenge of false positives,According to a 2021 Fastly report, about are false positives. This can create an issue for public safety, as it's difficult to determine the difference between malicious and benign behavior. These alerts could also prompt false alarms, such as the cyber equivalent of the , when in reality they may simply be a system or human failure. Here are some tips on how to mitigate the number of false positives when it comes to cyber security in the government sector:,How automated solutions can help public sector cyber security,Systems that automatically determine baseline network activity and detect anomalous behavior in a public sector agency may be able to identify a leak in the system before it becomes a crisis. Hackers can exploit weak points in a network to steal valuable information, even if the attacker isn't located on the same physical network. Learn more about to cyber security in the government sector. If you'd like to receive new articles, solutions briefs, whitepapers and more—just let us know. . * Indicates a required field. 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